BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME FROM THE ,j., SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND THE GIFT OF Henrg W. Sage 1891 JLldHA ^5AA.r CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 924 081 312 070 Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31 924081 31 2070 Toronto of Old: Collections and Recollections, ILLUSTRATIVE OF THE EARLY SETTLEMENT AND SOCIAL LIFE OF THE CAPITAL OF ONTARIO. By henry SCADDING, D.D., Canon of St. James', Toronto. TORONTO; WILLING & WILLIAMSON. 1878. @ /• ro Entered according to Act of the Parliament of Canada, in the year One Thou- sand Eight Hundred and Seventy-three, by Adam, Stevenson & Co., in the office of the Minister of Agriculture, Hunter, Rose & Co., Printers, Stereotypers and Bookbinders, Toronto. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE f.^£ (garl of guffertit, !.€.§., GOVERNOR GENERAL' OF BRITISH NORTH AMERICA, A KEEN SYMPATHIZER WITH THE MINUTE PAST, AS WELL AS THE MINUTE PRESENT, OF THE PEOPLE COMMITTED TO HIS CHARGE, C^is Wohmt, TREATING OF THE INFANCY AND EARLY YOUTH OF AN IMPORTANT CANADIAN CIVIC COMMUNITY NOW FAST RISING TO MAn's ESTATE. IS (BY PERMISSION GRACIOUSLY GIVEN,) THANKFULLY AND LOYALLY DEDICATED. LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. P\GE Chiel Justice Osgoode, (Steel Engravin:;) Frontispiece. Russell Abbey " 33 York in 1803 40 Fish Market, 1830 50 Site of old Fort, Toronto 73 York in 1813 83 Upper Canada College in 1830 93 First Methodist Church 95 King Street in 1834 loi William Lyon Mackenzie 137 Governor Simcoe 237 Right Hon. Henry Dundas 305 Sir George Yonge 388 Toronto Harbour in 1 793 .- 508 " '82° 544 Map of Toronto in 1878 cgj ©irittlotts of ike #ugUslt ^jm. From the " Saturday Review," London. Dr- Soadding's Toranto of Old contains a good deal of curious and interesting information regarding the early history and actual monuments of a place which has risen, within a century, from the rank of a French trading-p ost to that of a Provincial Capital of the Canadian Dominion. It is also replete with anecdote, historical and personal, very characteristic of Colonial life in its various stages, from the first advance into the wilderness down to the combination of old world civilization with the abundance and the roominess of a new country, which characterizes Canada and Australia at present. From "The Academy," London. . Short as has been the life of this flourishing Canadian City (Toronto,) it has afforded ample material for a very interesting book, by one who is evi- dently possessed in a hi^h degree with a love of historical research. To the true student of history it makes little difference whether the events in which he is interested took place in far remote or in recent times. The methods by which truth is to be picked out from falsehood are the same, whether he is dealing with Greek Republics, mediaeval countships, or the cities of the New World. The same plodding industry is required, the same temptations against vapid generaUzation and sensation paragraph writing have to be overcome. Dr. Soaddiug has avoided both these pitfalls, and a most useful and amusing book has been the consequence. We have not, as is too common in transatlantic literature, weary discussions in insoluble questions of ethnology, but instead thereof a carefully compiled history of what we, writing for EngUshmen, must call a very modern city. . The_writer has a warm affection for the old country and the old country's language, which we are glad to .see. A pleasant sounding Old English word, such as reeve, warden, provost, or recorder, evidently cheers him, as the flowers we have loved in childhood cheer us when we meet them in old age far, far away from home. . The Canadians, as a people, seem to share Dr. Soadding's conservative love for things English The record of the grants of land from the beginning of the organization of Upper Canada to the present time is called Domesday-Book. . . PROM THE " Spectator," (London, England). Not quite two centuries ago, the name of " Toronto " was probably first known to Europeans as that of a portage on Lake Ontario, the exact locality of which was not very clearly defined, the head quarters of Wyandot or Huron Indians, a mere pass through which French Agents made their way in their trading ex- peditions, but where no buildings of any kind at that time existed; yet, already, VI op;nions of the enolish peess. so rapid is ^he course of progress and innovation, that obscure spot has become so modernised a city, that it has been found necessary to collect into a volume the traditions of its local past, and the recollections of its primitive life and manners, in order to prevent them from entirely fading away. Dr. Scadding — himself, as he says, identified from boyhood with Toronto-^has devoted him- self lovingly to this task ; and if in his zeal to procure every record of a past which, to others, as well as himself, must be full of interest, he has exceeded the limits to which he intended to confine himself, and produced a book of pon- derous dimensions and elaborate research, his painstaking investigations will be appreciated by all who care to follow the rise and progress of one of the most important settlements of the old lands beyond the sea. ... In his account of Toronto of old, while disclaiming all intention of writing a history, Dr. Scad- ding proceeds to describe street by street, and, as it were, to reconstruct and repeople for us the old Canadian town. As he walks along he points with his wand to some particular building, and forthwith a civic notability, a learned divine, a man of science, or mayhap a personage of much humbler position, stands forth in the garb and manners of his time, appropriately surrounded by the quaint edifices which occupied the places of the handsome modern erections which have supplanted them. . One of the most picturesque as well as interesting pieces of description in Dr. Scadding's book is his account of the Valley of the Don, with its quaint bridges, its mills, its pine groves, its sal- mon-fishing by night, its scattered country residences, and the birds and beasts of various kinds to be found there. But we have not time to glance at any more of the contents of this carefully-written and closely printed volume. Suffice it to say, that those, and they are many, who from residence in or connection with Canada, take an interest in its second capital, and desire to trace it from its cradle to its present state of prosperity, will find in Dr. Scad- ding^s pages a mass of material from which they may gather all the informa- tion which they can possibly desire. From the " G-uakdian" (London, England). ■ • • Our space does not allow us to do more than commend the volume to the favourable notice of our readers, by referring to a few names and incidents which "we have noted in looking through its pages, and which may prove that it treats of other than local celebrities and achievements. We are reminded by the mention of Thomas Moore, that Toronto enjoys the advantage of proximity to the world-wonder of the Falls of Niagara, and thus attracts to itself, as a convenient starting-point at least, many of those who desire to gaze on a spec- tacle which has been very happily characterized as " the sublimity of motion." Had it not been for Niagara, Moore would probably never have visited the inland waters of the west— " Where the blue hills of old Toronto shed Their evening shadows o'er Ontario's bed." Of the accomplished Mrs. Jameson we find many interesting notices, as in the course of his topograpical description, the author arrives at the dwelling long OPINIONS or THE ENGLISH PKESS. yij occupied by her hvisbancl, who filled in succession the offices of Attorney-Gene- raJ and Vice-Chaucellor of Upper Canada. , . We congratulate the author on the successful effort which he has made, in a new country, to connect the present with the past, even so far as to lead Canadians of the present generation to look with sympathy and respect to the pioneers of the civilization which they inherit ; we are assured, moreover, from the tone of the hook throughout, that the aim of the author has been yet higher and nobler ; that he regards these " pilgrim fathers " as the children of British homes ; and that he would trace to the influences of that home their intellectual and moral acH to labour so successfully as they did for the benefit of their posterity. ERRATA in addition to those noted at p. 580. p. 5, 1. 22, for in read into ; p. 25, 1. 25, for Eastward read Westward ; p. 71, 1. 19, for acres read arcs ; p. 58, 1. 29, read indispensable ; p. 95, 1. 37, for oppo- site of read same as ; p. 127, 1. 14, for Lincoln read Peterborough (also in Index) ; p. 150, 1. 1, ioT protoplasm read inception (without quotation marks) ,■ p. 166,. 1. 18, for MuoTc read Mor.e ; p. 179, 1. 7, for 1849 read I84I; p. 325, 1. 27, for should read would ; p. 373, 1. 14, foi pi aisaunee read pleasaunce ; p. 392, 1. 19, for The first read Atjirst; p. 406, 1. 2, for in read on.; p. 406, 1. 21, for Wetherell read Withrow ; p. 417, 1. 28, after was insert of; p. 426, 1. 27, for ITonrn read Augustus ; p. 559, 1. 24, substitute comma for period after Don ; p. 560, 1. 17, dele quotation marks ; p. 572, 1. 8, for has read had. The lines at p. 231 are by. John Macdonald, Esq., M.P. for Toronto. PREFACE. T is singular that the elder Disraeli has not included in his " Curiosities of Literature " a chapter on Books originating in Accident. It is exactly the kind of topic we might have expected him to discuss, in his usual pleasant manner. Of such productions there is doubtless somewhere a record. Whenever it shall be discovered, the volume here presented to the reader must be added to the list. A few years since, when preparing for a local periodical a paper of "Early Notices of Toronto," the writer little imagined what the sheets then under his hand would finally grow to. The expectation at the time simply was, that the article on which he was at work would assist as a minute scintilla in one of those monthly meteoric showers of miscellaneous light literature with which the age is so familiar ; that it would engage, perhaps, the attention for a few moments of a chance gazer here and there, and then vanish in the usual way. But on a subsequent revision, the subject thus casually taken up seemed capable of being more fully handled. Two or three friends, moreover, had expressed a regret that to the memoranda given, gathered chiefly from early French documents, there had not been added some of the more recent floating folklore of the community, some of the homely table-talk of the older people of the place ; such of the mixed traditions, in short, of the local Past of Toronto as might seem of value as illus- trations of primitive colonial life and manners. It was urged, like- wise, in several quarters, that if something in this direction were not speedily done, the men of the next generation would be left vi (Preface. irremediably ignorant of a multitude of minute particulars relating to their immediate predecessors, and the peculiar conditions under which were so bravely executed the many labours whereby for pos- terity the path onward has been made smooth. For many years the writer had quietly concerned himself with such matters. Iden- tified with Toronto from boyhood, to him the long, straight ways of the place nowhere presented barren, monotonous vistas. To him innumerable objects and sites on the right hand and on the left, in almost every quarter, called up reminiscences, the growth partly of his own experience and observation, and partly the residuum of discourse with others, all invested with a certain degree of rational, human interest, as it seemed to him. But still, that he was some- time to be the compiler of an elaborate volume on the subject never seriously entered his thoughts. Having, however, as was narrated, once tapped the vein, he was led step by step to further explorations, until the result was reached which the reader has now placed before him. By inspection it will be seen that the plan pursued was to pro- ceed rather deliberately through the principal thoroughfares, noticing persons and incidents of former days, as suggested by buildings and situations in the order in which they were severally seen ; rely- ing in the first instance on personal recollections for the most part, and then attaching to every coigne of vantage such relevant informa- tion as could be additionally gathered from coevals and seniors, or gleaned from such literary relics, in print or manuscript of an early date, as. could be secured. Here and there, brief digressions into adjacent streets were made, when a house or the scene of an inci- dent chanced to draw the supposed pilgrim aside. The perambu- lation of Yonge Street was extended to the Holland Landing, and even to Penetanguishene, the whole line of that lengthy route presenting points more or less noteworthy at short intervals. Finally a chapter on the Marine of the Harbour was decided on, the boats and vessels of the place, their owners and commanders, entering, as is natural, so largely into the retrospect of the inhabi- tants of a Port. Although the imposing bulk of the volume may look like evi- dence to the contrary, it has been our ambition all along not to incur the reproach of prolixity. We have endeavoured to express whatever we had to say as concisely as we could. Several narra- tives have been disregarded which probably, in some quarters. (Preface. vii will be sought for here. But while anxious to present as varied and minute a picture as possilje of the local Past, we considered it inexpedient to chronicle anything that was unduly trivial. Thus if we have not succeeded in being everywhere piquant, we trust we shall be found nowhere unpardonably dull : an achievement of some merit, surely, when our material, comprising nothing that was exceptionally romantic or very grandly heroic, is considered. And a first step has, as we conceive, been taken towards generating for Toronto, for many of its streets and byways, for many of its nooks and corners, and its neighbourhood generally, a certain modicum of that charm which, springing from association and popular legend, so delightfully invests, to the prepared and sensitive mind, every square rood of the old lands beyond the sea. It will be proper, after all, however, perhaps to observe, that the reader who expects to find in this book a formal history of even Toronto of Old, will be disappointed. It was no part of the writer's design to furnish a narrative of every local event occurring in the periods referred to, with chronological digests, statistical tables, and catalogues exhibiting in full the Christian names and surnames of all the first occupants of lots. For such information recourse must be had to the offices of the several public function- aries, municipal and provincial, where whole volumes in folio, filled with the desired particulars, will be found. We have next gratefully to record our obligations to those who during the composition of the following pages encouraged the undertaking in various ways. Especial thanks are due to the Association of Pioneers, whose names are given in detyil in the ' Appendix, and who did the writer the honour of appointing him their Historiographer. Before assemblages more or less numerous, of this body, large abstracts of the Collections and Recollections here permanently garnered, were read and discussed. Several of the members of this society, moreover, gave special siances at their respective homes for the purpose of listening to portions of the same. Those who were so kind as to be at the trouble of doing this were the Hon. W. P. Howland, C. B., Lieutenant-Governor; the Rev. Dr. Richardson ; Mr. J. G. Worts (twice); Mr. R. H. Gates; Mr. James Stitt; Mr. J. T. Smith; Mr. W. B. Phipps (twice).— The Canadian Institute, by permitting the publication in its Jour- nal of successive instalments of these papers, contributed materi- ally to the furtherance of the work, as without the preparation for viii ^Preface. the press from time to time which was thus necessitated, it is pos- sible the volume itself, as a completed whole, would never have appeared. To the following gentlemen we are indebted for the use of papers or books, for obliging replies to queries, and for items of information otherwise communicated : — Mr. W. H. Lee of Ottawa; Judge Jarvis of Cornwall; Mr. T. J. Preston of York- ville ; Mr. W. Helliwell of the Highland Creek ; the late Col. G. T. Denison of Rusholme, Toronto ; Mr. M. F. Whitehead of Port Hope ; Mr. Devine of the Crown Lands Department ; Mr. H. J. Jones of the same Department ; Mr. Russel Inglis of Toronto ; Mr. J. G. Howard of Toronto ; the Rev. J. Carry of Holland Landing; Major McLeod of Drynoch ; the Rev. George Hallen of Penetanguishene ; the Ven. Archdeacon Fuller, of Toronto ; Mr. G. A. Barber, of Toronto.; Mr. J. T. Kerby, of Niagara ; the Rev. Saltern Givins of Yorkville ; the Rev. A. Sanson of To- ronto ; the Rev. Dr. McMurray of Niagara ; the Rev. Adam Elliott of Tuscarora ; Mr. H. J. Morse of Toronto ; Mr. W. Kirby of Niagara ; Mr. Morgan Baldwin of Toronto ; Mr. J. McEwan of Sandwich; Mr. W. D. Campbell of Quebec; Mr. T. Cot- trill Clarke of Philadelphia. — Mrs. Cassidy of Toronto kindly allowed the use of two (now rare) volumss, pubhshed in 1765, by her near kinsman. Major Robert Rogers. Through Mr. Homer Dixon of the Homewood, Toronto, a long loan of the earliest edi- tion of the first Gazetteer of Upper Canada was procured from the library of the Young Men's Christian Association of Toronto. — The Rev. Dr. Ryerson, Chief Superintendent of Education, and Dr. Hodgins, Deputy Superintendent, courteously permitted an unrestricted access to the Departmental Library, rich in works of special value to any one prosecuting researches in early Canadian history. To Mr. G. Mercer Adam we are much beholden for a careful, friendly interest taken in the typographical execution and fair appearance generally of the volume. The two portraits which, in no mere conventional selise, enrich the work, were engraved from miniatures very artistically drawn for the purpose, from original paintings never before copied, in the possession of Capt. J. K. Simcoe, R. N., of Wolford, in the County of Devon. The circulation to be expected for a book like the present must be chiefly local. Nevertheless, it is to be presumed that there are persons scattered up ind down in various parts of Canada and the (Preface. ix United States, who, having been at some period of their lives fami- liar with Toronto, and retaining still a kindly regard for the place, will like to possess such a memorial of it in the olden time as is here offered. And even in the old home-countries across the Atlantic — England, Scotland and Ireland — there are probably members of military and other families once resident at Toronto, to whom such a reminder of pleasant hours, as it is hoped, passed there, will not be unacceptable. For similar reasons the book, were its existence known, would be welcome here and there in Australia and New Zealand, and other colonies and settlements of England. In an attempt to narrate so many particulars of time, place, per- son and circumstance, it can scarcely be hoped that errors have been wholly avoided. It is earnestly desired that any that may be ■ detected will be adverted to with kindness and charity, and not in a carping tone. Unfairly, sometimes, a slip discovered, however tri- vial, is emphatically dwelt on, to the ignoring of almost all the points in respect of which complete accuracy has been secured, at the cost of much painstaking. Conscious that our aim throughout has been to be as minutely correct as possible, we ask for consideration in this regard. A certain slight variety which will perhaps be noticed in the orthography of a few Indian and other names is to be attri- buted to a like absence of uniformity in the documents consulted. While the forms which we ourselves prefer will be readily discerned, it was not judged advisable everywhere to insist on them. lo Trinity Square, Toronto, June 4th, 1873. CONTENTS. Introductory, ...... Sect. I.— Palace Street to the Market Place, " II. — Front Street : from the Market Place to Brock Street, ..... " III.— From Brock Street to the Old French Fort, " IV. — Fro;n the Garrison back to the place of beginning, " V.^King Street : From John Street to Yonge Street, . PAGE. I ■ 25 VI.— VII.— VIII.— IX.— X.— XI — From Yonge Street to Church Street Digression Southwards at Church Street : Market Lane, St. James'. Church, . " Continued, . " Digression northward at Church Street : the Old District Gram- mar School, XII.— " From Church Street to George St., XIII.' — " Digression into Duke Street, XIV. — " From George Street to Caroline Street, .... XV. — " From Caroline Street to Berkeley Street, . XVI. — From Berkeley Street to the Bridge and across it, XVII.— The Valley of the Don : (i). From the Bridge on the Kingston Road to Tyler's, .... (2). From Tyler's to the Big Bend, . (3). From the Big Bend to Castle Frank Brook, .... (i\). Castle Frank, .... (S). On to the Ford and the Mills, 48 67 78 88 109 117 129 139 152 172 180 184 195 20t 225 228 236 241 xu Contents. Sect. XVIII.- " XIX.- " XX.- XXI.- " XXII.- " XXIII.- " XXIV.- " XXV.- " XXVI.- « XXVII.- "XXVIII.- " XXIX.- " XXX.- " XXXI.- " XXXII.- Appendix. Index. -Queen Street : from the Don Bridge to Caroline Street, . . . . • " Digression at Caroline Street : His- tory of the Early Press, From George Street to Yonge St. Memories of the Old Court House " From Yonge Street to College Avenue, Digression Southward at Bay St., Osgoode Hall, Digression Northward at the Col- lege Avenue, " From the College Avenue to Brock Street and Spadina Avenue, . " From Brock Street and Spadina Avenue to the Humber, . Yonge Street : From the Bay to Yorkville, " From Yorkville to Hogg's Hollow, " From Hogg's Hollow to Bond's Lake, .... " From Bond's Lake to the Holland Landing, with Digressions to Newmarket and Sharon, " Onward, from Holland Landing to Penetanguishene, . Its Marine, 1793-99, -The Harbour Do. Do. Do. do. do. do. 1800-14, 1815-27, 1828-63, 244 258 284 290 305 308 312 318 326 345 375 411 445 466 496 508 525 538 563 577 581 INTRODUCTORY. ; N French colonial documents of a very respectable antiquity, we meet with the name Toronto again and again. It is given as an appellation that is well- known, and its form in the greater number of in- stances is exactly that which it has now permanently assumed, but here and there its orthography varies by a letter or two, as is usually the case with strange terms when taken down by ear. In a Memoir on the state of affairs in Canada, transmitted to France in 1686, by the Governor in Chief of the day, the Marquis de Denonville, the familiar word appears. Addressing the Minister de Seignelay, the Marquis says : " The letters I wrote to Sieurs du Lhu and de la Durantaye, of which I sent you copies, will inform you of my orders to them to fortify the two passages leading to Michilimaquina. Sieur du Lhu is at that of the Detroit of Lake Erie, and Sieur de la Durantaye at that of the portage of Toronto. These two posts" the marquis observes, " will block the passage against the English, if they undertake to go again to MichiHmaquina, and will serve as retreats to the savages our allies either while hunting or marching against the Iroquois." Again, further on in the same Despatch, Denonville says ; " I have heard that Sieur du Lhu is arrived at the post of the Detroit of Lake Erie, with fifty good men well-armed, with munitions of war and provisions and all other necessaries sufficient to guarantee them against the severe cold, and to render them comfortable during the whole winter on the spot where they will entrench themselves. M. de la Durantaye is collecting people to entrench himself at Michilimaquina and to occupy the other pass which the English may take by Toronto, the other entrance to lake Huron. In this way " the marquis assures de Seignelay, " our Englishmen 2 Toronto of Old. will have somebody to speak to. All this, however," he reminds the minister, " cannot be accomplished without considerable expense, but still" he adds, "we must maintain our honour and our prosperity." Du Lhu and de la Durantaye here named were the French agents or superintendents in what was then the Far West. Du Lhu is the same person whose name, under the form of Duluth, has become in recent times so well known, as appertaining to a town near the head of Lake Superior, destined in the future to be one of the great Railway Junctions of the continent, like Buffalo or Chicago. The Englishmen for whom M. de Denonville desired an instruc- tive reception to be prepared were some of the people of Governor Dongan of the province of New York. Governor Dongan either could not or would not restrain his people from poaching for furs on the French King's domain. When Denonville wrote his despatch in 1686 some of these illicit traders had been recently seen in the direction of Michilimackinac, having passed up by the way of Lake Erie. To intercept them on their return, the Marquis reports that he has stationed " a bark, some canoes and twenty good men " at the river communicating from Lake Erie with that of Ontario near Niagara, by which place the English who ascended Lake Erie must of necessity pass on their return home with their peltries. " I regard, Monseigneur," continues Denonville to the minister, " as of primary importance the prohibition of this trade to the Enghsh, who, without doubt, would entirely ruin ours both by the cheaper bargains they could give the Indians, and by attracting to them the Frenchmen of our colony who are accustomed to go into the woods." Governor Dongan was also always hold- ing communications with the Iroquois and spiriting them on to resist French encroachments. He even audaciously asserted that his own sovereign — it soon became doubtful who that was, whether James II. or William of Orange — was the rightful supreme lord of the Iroquois territory. As to the particular spot intended when Denonville says M. de la Durantaye is about to occupy " the pass which the English may take by Toronto," there may seem at first to be .some ambi- guity. In 1686 the vicinage of Lake Simcoe, especially the district between Lake Simcoe and Lake Huron, appears to have been Introductory. 3 commonly known as the Toronto region. We deduce this from the old contemporarj' maps, on one or other of which Matchedash bay is the Bay of Toronto ; the river Severn is the Toronto river ; Lake Simcoe itself is Toronto Lake ; the chain of Lakes passing south-eastward from the neighbourhood of Lake Simcoe and issuing by the Trent in the Bay of Quints is also the Toronto river or lake-chain, and again, the Humber, running southwesterly from the vicinity of Lake Simcoe into Lake Ontario, is likewise occasionally the Toronto river : the explanation of all which phraseology is to be found in the supposition that the Severn, the Trent chain of lakes, and the Humber, were, each of them, a commonly-frequented line of water-communication with a Toronto region — a well-peopled district — "a place of meeting," the haunt of numerous allied families and friendly bands. (That such is the most probable interpretation of the term Toronto, we shall here- after see at large.) The spot to be occupied by de la Durantaye for the purpose of defending " the Pass at Toronto '' might therefore be either in the Toronto region itself at the Lake Huron end of the trail leading from Lake Ontario, or at the Lake Ontario end of the same trail, at the point where English trespassers coming from the direction of the Iroquois territory would disembark, when intending to penetrate to Michilimackinac by this route. At the first-mentioned point, viz, the Lake Huron end of the trail, it was early recommended that a fort should be established, as we learn from letter twenty-three of Lahontan, but we do not hear that such a structure was ever erected there. The remains of solid buildings that have been found in that quarter are those of Jesuit mission-houses, and not of a formal fort established by the French government. At the last-mentioned spot, on the contrary, viz, the Lake Ontario end of the trail, it is certain that a fortified trading-post was early erected ; the official designation of which, as we shall presently learn, was Fort Rouill6, but the name by which it came in the course of time to be popularly known was Fort Toronto, as being the object which marked and guarded the southern terminus of the trail or portage leading to the district in the interior commonly called the Toronto region. It was here then, near the embouchure of the modern Canadian Humber, that "our Englishmen," as Denonville expressed himself, crossing over on illicit errands from Governor Dongan's 4 Toronto of Old. domain to that of the King of France, were to find " somebody ta speak to." The order sent to Durantaye was indeed not immediately exe- cuted. In 1687 Denonville reports as follows to the authorities at Paris : "I have altered " he says, "the orders I had originally ^^^7- giygji jast year to M. de la Durantaye to pass by Toronto and to enter Lake Ontario at Gandatsi-tiagon to form a junction with M. du Lhu at Niagara. I have sent him word, " he continues, " by Sieur Juchereau, who took back the two Hurons and Outaouas chiefs this winter, to join Sieur du Lhu at the Detroit of Lake Erie, so that they may be stronger, and in a condition to resist the enemy, should he go to meet them at Niagara.'' In 1687 the business in contemplation was something more serious than the mere repression of trespass on the part of a few stray traders from Governor Dongan's province. The confed- erated Iroquois were, if possible, to be humbled once for all. From the period of Montmagny's arrival in 1637 the French settlements to the eastward had suffered from the fierce inroads of the Iroquois. The predecessor of Denonville, de la Barre, had made a peace with them on terms that caused them to despise the French ; and their boldness had since increased to such a degree that the existence of the settlements was imperilled. In a Report to the minister at. Paris on this subject M. de Denonville again names Toronto ; and he clearly considers it a post of sufficient note to be classed, for the moment, with Fort Frontenac, Niagara and Michilimackinac. To achieve success against the Iroquois, he informed the minister, 3000 men would be required. Of such a force, he observes, he has at the time only one half ; but he boasts of more, he says, for reputation's sake : "for the rest of the militia are necessary to protect and cultivate the farms of the country ; and a part of the force," he then adds, " must be employed in guarding the posts of Fort Frontenac, Niagara, Toronto, and Missilimackinac, so as to secure the aid which he expects from Illinois and from the other Indians, on whom however he cannot rely," he says, " unless he shall be able alone to defeat the five Iroquois nations." The campaign which ensued, though nominally a success, was attended with disastrous consequences. The blows struck, not having been followed up with sufficient vigour, simply further exasperated " the five Iroquois nations," and entailed a frightful Introductory. 5 retaliation. In 1689 took place the famous massacre of Lachine and devastation of the island of Montreal. Denonville was super- seded as his predecessor de la Barre had been. The Count de Frontenac was appointed his sucessor, sent out for the second time, Governor General of New France. Some years now elapse before we light on another notice of Toronto. But at length we again observe the familiar word in one of the Reports or Memoirs annually despatched from Can- ada to France. In 1749 M. dela Galissoni6re, administra- "^749- tor in the absence of the Governor in Chief, de la Jonqui^re, informs the King's minister in Paris that he has given orders for erecting a stockade and establishing a royal trading post at Toronto. This was expected to be a counterpoise to the trading-post of Choueguen on the southern side of the Lake, newly erected by the English at the mouth of the Oswego river, on the site of the present town of Oswego. Choueguen itself had been established as a set-off to the fort at the mouth of the Niagara river, which had been built there by the French in spite of remonstrances on the part of the authorities at New York. Choueguen at first was simply a so-called "beaver trap" or trading-post, established by permission, nominally obtained, of the Iroquois ; but it speedily developed in a strong stone-fort, and became, in fact, a standing menace to Fort Frontenac, on the northern shore of the Lake. Choueguen likewise drew to itself a large share of the valuable peltries of the north shore, which used before to find their way down the St. Lawrence to Montreal and Quebec. The goods offered at the English trading-post of Choueguen were found to be superior to the French goods, and the price given for furs was greater there than on the French side of the water. The storekeeper at Niagara told the Abb6 Picquet, of whom we shall hear again presently, that the Indians compared the silver-trinkets which were procured at Choueguen with those which were procured at the French Stores ; and they found that the Choueguen articles were as heavy as the others, of purer silver and better workmanship, but did not cost them quite two beavers, whilst for those offered for sale at the French King's post, ten beavers were demanded. " Thus we are discredited " the Abb6 complained, "and this silver-ware remains a pure loss in the King's stores. French brandy indeed," the Abb6 adds, " was preferred to the English : nevertheless that did not prevent the Indians 6 Toronto of Old. going to Choueguen. To destroy the trade there," he affirms, " the King's posts ought to have been suppHed with the same goods as- Choueguen and at the same price. The French ought also," he- says, " to have been forbidden to send the domiciUated Indians thither : but that" he confesses, " would have been very difficult." Choueguen had thus, in the eyes of the French authorities, come to be a little Carthage that must be put down, or, at all events- crippled to the greatest possible extent. Accordingly, as a counterpoise in point of commercial influence, Toronto, as we have seen, was to be made a fortified trading post. " On being informed " says M. de la Galissoni^re, in the docu- ment referred to, bearing date 1 749, " that the northern Indians ordinarily went to Choueguen with their peltries by way of Toronto on the northwest side of Lake Ontario, twenty-five leagues from Niagara, and seventy-five from Fort Frontenac, it was thought advisable to establish a post at that place and to send thither an officer, fifteen soldiers, and some workmen, to construct a small stockade-fort there. Its expense will not be great," M. de la Galissoniere assures the minister, " the timber is transported there, and the remainder will be conveyed by the barques belonging to Fort Frontenac. Too much care cannot be taken," remarks the Administrator, "to prevent these Indians continuing their trade with the English, and to furnish them at this post with all their necessaries, even as cheap as at Choueguen. Messrs. de la Jonquifere and Bigot will permit some canoes to go there on license and will apply the funds as a gratuity to the officer in command there. But it will be necessary to order the commandants at Detroit, Niagara, and Fort Frontenac, to be careful that the traders and store-keepers of these posts furnish goods for two or three years to come, at the same rates as the English. By these means the Indians will disaccustom themselves from going to Choueguen, and the English will be obhged to abandon that place." De la Galissoniere returned to France in 1 749. He was a naval officer and fond of scientific, pursuits. It was he who in 1756, commanded the expedition against Minorca, which led to the execution of Admiral Byng. From a despatch written by M. de Longueil in 1752, we gather that the post of the Toronto portage, in its improved, strengthened state, is known as Fort Rouill6, so named, doubtless from '^52- Antoine Louis Rouille, Count de Jouy, Colonial Minister Introductory. 7 from 1749 to 1754. M. de Longueil says that " M. de Celeron had addressed certain despatches to M. de Lavalterie, the com- mandant at Niagara, who detached a soldier to convey them to Fort Rouill6, with orders to the store-keeper at that post to trans- mit them promptly to Montreal. It is not known," he remarks, " what became of that soldier." About the same time, a MississaguS from Toronto arrived at Niagara, who informed M. de Lavalterie that he had not seen that soldier at the Fort, nor met him on the way. " It is to be feared that he has been killed by Indians," he adds, "and the despatches carried to the English.'' An uncomfortable Anglophobia was reigning at Fort RouilW, as generally along the whole of the north shore of Lake Ontario in 1752. We learn this also from another passage in the same des- patch. "The store-keeper at Toronto, says," M. de Longueil writes to M. de Verch6res, commandant at Fort Frontenac, " that some trustworthy Indians have assured him that the Saulteux (Otchip- ways,) who killed our Frenchman some years ago, have dispersed themselves along the head of Lake Ontario ; and seeing himself sur- rounded by them,' he doubts not but they have some evil design on his Fort. There is no doubt," he continues, " but 'tis the English who are inducing the Indians to destroy the French, and that they would give a good deal to get the Savages to destroy Fort Toronto, on account of the essential injury it does their trade at Choueguen.'' Such observations help us to imagine the anxious life which the lonely occupants of Fort RouillS must have been leading at the period referred to. From an abstract of a journal or memoir of the Abb6 Picquet given in the Documentary History of the State of New York (i. 283), we obtain a glimpse of the state of things at the same place, about the same period, from the point of view, however, of an interested ecclesiastic. The Abb6 Picquet was a doctor of the Sorbonne, and bore the titles of King's Missionary and Prefect Apostolic of Canada. He established a mission at Os- wegatchie (Ogdensburg) which was known as La Presentation, and which became virtually a military outpost of Fort Frontenac. He was very useful to the authorities at Quebec in advocating French interests on the south side of the St. Lawrence. The Marquis du Quesne used to say that the Abb6 Picquet was worth ten regiments to New France. His activity was so great, especially among the Six Nations, that even during his lifetime he was complimented 8 Toronto of Old. with the title of " Apostle of the Iroquois." When at length the French power fell he retired to France, where hedied in 1781. In 1 7 5 1 the Abb6 made a tour of exploration round Lake Ontario. He was conveyed in a King's canoe, and was accompanied by one of bark containing five trusty natives. He visited Fort Frontenac and the Bay of Quint6 ; especially the site there of an ancient mission which M. Dollikes de Kleus and Abb^ d'Urffi, priests of the St. Sulpice Seminary had established. " The quarter is beautiful," the Abbe remarks, "but the land is not good." He then visited Fort Toronto, the journal goes on to say, seventy leagues from Fort Frontenac, at the west end of Lake Ontario. He found good bread and good wine there, it is stated, and everything requi- site for the trade, whilst they were in want of these things at all the other posts. He found Mississagu6s there, we are told, who flocked around him ; they spoke first of the happiness their young people, the women and children, would feel if the King would be as good to them as to the Iroquois, for whom he procured mission- aries. They complained that instead of building a church, they had constructed only a canteen for them. The Abb6 Picquet, we are told, did not allow them to finish ; and answered them that they had been treated according to their fancy ; that they had never evinced the least zeal for religion ; that their conduct was much opposed to it ; that the Iroquois on the contrary had mani- fested their love for Christianity. But as he had no order, it is subjoined, to attract them, viz., the Mississagu6s, to his mission at La Presentation— he avoided a more lengthened explanation. The poor fellows were somewhat unfairly lectured by the Abb6, for, according to his own showing, they expressed a desire for a church amongst them. A note on the Mississagu6s in the Documentary History (i. 22) mentions the neighbourhood of Toronto as one of the quarters frequented by that tribe : at the same time it sets down their num- bers as incredibly few. " The Mississagu6s," the note says, "are dispersed along this lake (Ontario), some at Kent6, others at the river Toronto (the Humber'), and finally at the head of the Lake, to the number of 150 in all ; and at Matchedash. The principal tribe is that of the Crane." The Abb6 Picquet visited Niagara and the Portage above (Queenston or Lewiston) ; and in connection with his observations on those points he refers again expressly to Toronto. He is op- Introductory. g posed to the maintenance of store-houses for trade at Toronto, because it tended to diminish the trade at Niagara and Fort Frontenac, " those two ancient posts," as he styles them. " It was necessary," he says, " to supply Niagara, especially the Portage, rather than Toronto. The difference," he says, "between the two first of these posts and the last is, that three or four hundred canoes could come loaded with furs to the Portage (Queenston or Lewiston) ; and that no canoes could go to Toronto except those which cannot pass before Niagara and to Fort Frontenac — (the translation appears to be obscure) — such as the Ottawas of the Head of the Lake and the Mississagu6s : so that Toronto could not but diminish the trade of these two ancient posts, which would have been sufficient to stop all the savages had the stores been furnished with goods to their liking." In 1752, a French military expedition from Quebec to the Ohio region, rested at Fort Toronto. Stephen Coffen, in his narrative of that expedition, which he accompanied as a volunteer, names the place, but he spells the word in accordance with his own pro- nunciation, Taranto. " They on their way stopped," he says " a couple of days at Cadaraghqui Fort, also at Taranto on the north side of Lake Ontario ; then at Niagara fifteen days." In 1756, the hateful Choueguen, which had given occasion to the establishment of Toronto as a fortified trading-post, was rased to the ground. Montcalm, who afterwards fell on the Plains of Abraham, had been entrusted with the task of destroying the '-' offensive stronghold of the English on Lake Ontario. He wentabout the work with some reluctance, deeming the project of the Gover- nor-General, De Vaudreuil, to be rash. Circumstances, however, unexpectedly favoured him ; and the garrison of Choueguen, in other words, of Oswego, capitulated. " Never before," said Mont- calm, in his report of the affair to the Home Minister, " did 3,000 men, with a scanty artillery, besiege 1,800, there being 2,000 ene- mies within call, as in the late affair ; the party attacked having a superior marine, also, on Lake Ontario. The success gained has been contrary to all expectation. The conduct I followed in this affair," Montcalm continues, " and the dispositions I made, were so much out of the ordinary way of doing things that the au- dacity we manifested would be counted for rashness in Europe. Therefore, Monseigneur," he adds, " I beg of you as a favour to assure his Majesty that if he should accord to me wha,t I most lo Toronto of Old. wish for, employment in regular campaigning, I shall be guided by very dififerent principles." Alas, there was to be no more " regular campaigning" for Montcalm. His eyes were never again to gaze upon the battle fields in Bohemia, Italy and Germany, where, prior to his career in Canada, he had won laurels. The success before Choueguen in 1756 was followed by a more than counterbalancing disaster at Fort Frontenac in 1758. In that year a force of 3,000 men under Col. Bradstreet, detached from the army of Abercromby, stationed near Lake George, made a sudden descent on Fort Frontenac, from the New York side of the water, and captured the place. It was instantly and utterly de- stroyed, together with a number of vessels which had formed a part of the spoil brought away from Choueguen. On this occasion we find that the cry Hannibal ante Portas ! was once more fully expected to be heard speedily within the stockade at Toronto. M. de Vaudreuil, the Governor-General, informs the Minister at Paris, M. de Massiac, "that should the English make their appear- ance at Toronto, I have given orders to bum it at once, and to fall back on Niagara." One more order (the last), issuing from a French source, having reference to Toronto, is to be read in the records of the following year, 1759. M. de Vaudreuil, again in his despatch home, after stating that he had summoned troops firom Illinois and Detroit, to rendezvous at Presqu'isle on Lake Erie, adds, — "As those forces will proceed to the relief of Niagara, should the enemy wish to besiege it, I have in like manner sent orders to Toronto, to collect the Mississagues and other natives, to forward them to Niagara." The enemy, it appears, did wish to besiege Niagara ; and on the 2Sth of July they took it — an incident followed on the i8th of the next September by the fall of Quebec, and the transfer of all Can- ada to the British Crown. The year after the conquest a force was despatched by General Amherst from Montreal to proceed up the country and take possession of the important post at Detroit. It was conveyed in fifteen whale-boats and consisted of two hundred Rangers under the command of Major Robert Rogers. Major Rogers was accompanied by the following officers : Capt. Brewer, , Capt. Wait, Lieut. Bhreme, Assistant-Engineer, and Lieut. Davis of the Royal Train of Artillery. The party set out from Montreal on the 12th of September, 1760. The journal of Introductory. 1 1 IVtajor Rogers has been published. It includes an account of this ex- pedition. We give the complete title of the work, which is one sought after by book-collectors : " The Journals of Major Robert Rogers, containing an Account of the several Excursions he made under the Generals who commanded on the Continent of North America during the late War. From which may be collected the most ma- terial Circumstances of every Campaign upon that continent from the commencement to the conclusion of the War. London : Printed for the Author, and sold by J. Millan, bookseller, near Whitehall, MDCCLXV." We extract the part in which a visit to Toronto is spoken of He leaves the ruins of Fort Frontenac on the 25 th of September. On the 28th he enters the mouth of a river which he says is called by the Indians " The Grace of Man." (The Major probably mis- took, or was imposed upon, in the matter of etymology.) Here he found, he says, about fifty Mississaga Indians fishing for salmon. " At our first appearance," he continues, " they ran down, both men and boys to the edge of the Lake, and continued firing their pieces, to express their joy at the sight of the English colours, until such time as we had landed." About fifteen miles further on he enters another river, which he says, the Indians call " The Life of Man." " On the 30th," the journal proceeds : — " We embarked at the first dawn of day, and, with the assistance of sails and oars, made great way on a south-west course ; and in the evening reached the river Toronto (the Humber), having run seventy miles. Many points extending far into the water," Major Rogers remarks, "occa- sioned a frequent alteration of our course. We passed a bank of twenty miles in length, but the land behind it seemed to be level, well timbered with large oaks, hickories, maples, and some poplars. No mountains appeared in sight. Round the place where formerly the French had a fort, that was called Fort Toronto, there was a tract of about 300 acres of cleared ground. The soil here is princi- pally clay. The deer are extremely plenty in this country. Some Indians," Major Rogers continues, " were hunting at the mouth of the river, who ran into the woods at our approach, very much frightened. They came in however in the morning and testified their joy at the news of our success against the French. They told us that we could easily accomplish our journey from thence to Detroit in eight days ; that when the French traded at that place 12 Toronto of Old. (Toronto), the Indians used to come with their peltry from Michilimackina down the river Toronto ; that the portage was but twenty miles from that to a river falling into Lake Huron, which had some falls, but none very considerable ; they added that there was a carrying-place of fifteen miles from some westerly part of Lake Erie to a river running without any falls through several Indian towns into Lake St. Clair. I think Toronto," Major Rogers then states, " a most convenient place for a factory, and that from thence we may very easily settle the north side of Lake Erie." "We left Toronto,"the journal then proceeds, "the istofOctober, steering south, right across the west end of Lake Ontario. At dark, we arrived at the South Shore, five miles west of Fort Niagara, some of our boats now becoming exceeding leaky and dangerous. This morning, before we set out, I directed the following order of march : — The boats in a line. If the wind rose high, the red flag hoisted, and the boats to crowd nearer, that they might be ready to give mutual assistance in case of a leak or other accident, by which means we saved the crew and arms of the boat commanded by Lieutenant M'Cormack, which sprang a leak and sunk, losing nothing except the packs. We halted all the next day at Niagara, and provided ourselves with blankets, coats, shirts, shoes, mocca- sins, &c. I received from the commanding officer eighty barrels of provisions, and changed two whale-boats for as many batteaux, which proved leaky. In the evening, some of my party proceeded with the provisions to the Falls (the rapid water at Queenston), and in the morning marched the rest there, and began the portage of the provisions and boats. Messrs. Brheme and Davis took a survey of the great cataract of Niagara." At the time of Major Rogers' visit to Toronto all trading there had apparently ceased ; but we observe that he says it was most con- 1761. venient place for a factory. In 1 761, we have Toronto named in a letter addressed by Captain Campbell, commanding at Detroit, to Major Walters, commanding at Niagara, informing him of an intended attack of the Indians. " Detroit, June 17th, 1761, two o'clock in the morning. Sir,— I had the favour of yours,' with General Amherst's despatches. I have sent you an express with a very important piece of intelligence I have had the good fortune to discover. I have been lately alarmed with reports of the bad designs of the Indian nations against this place, and the English in Introductory. i ^ general. I can now inform you for certain it comes from the Six Nations ; and that they have sent belts of wampum and deputies to all the nations from Nova Scotia to the Illinois, to take up the hatchet against the English, and have employed the Mississaguas to send belts of wampum to the northern nations. Their project is as follows : — The Six Nations, at least the Senecas, are to as- semble at the head of French Creek, within five-and-twenty leagues of Presqu'isle ; part of the Six Nations (the Delawares and Shaw- nees), are to assemble on the Ohio; and at the same time, about the latter end of the month, to surprise Niagara and Fort Pitt, and cut off the communication everywhere. I hope this will come time enough to put you on your guard, and to send to Oswego, ajid all the posts in that communication. They expect to be joined by the nations that are to come from the North by Toronto." Eight years after the occupation of the country by the English, a considerable traffic was being carried on at Toronto. We learn this from a despatch of Sir William Johnson's to the Earl of Shel- bume, on the subject of Indian affairs, bearing date 1 767. Sir ^' '■ William affirms that persons could be found willing to pay ;^i,ooo per annum for the monopoly of the trade at Toronto. Some re- marks of his that precede the reference to Toronto give us some idea of the commercial tactics of the Indian and Indian trader of the time. "The Indians have no business to follow when at peace," Sir William Johnson says, "but hunting. Between each hunt they have a recess of several months. They are naturally very covetous," the same authority asserts, " and become daily better acquainted with the value of our goods and their own peltry; they are everywhere at home, and travel without the expense or inconvenience attending our journey to them. On the other hand, every step our traders take beyond the posts, is attended at least with some risk and a very heavy expense, which the Indians must feel as heavily on the purchase of their commodities ; all which considered, is it not reasonable to suppose that they would rather employ their idle time in quest of a cheap market, than sit down with such slender returns as they must receive in their own vil- lages?" He then instances Toronto. "As a proof of which," Sir William continues, "I shall give one instance concerning Toronto, on the north shore of Lake Ontario. Notwithstanding the assertion of Major Rogers," Sir William Johnson says, " that even a single trader would not think it worth attention to supply 14 Toronto of Old. a dependent post, yet I have heard traders of long experience and good circumstances affirm, that for the exclusive trade of that place, for one season, they would willingly pay ;!£'i,ooo — so certain were they of a quiet market — from the cheapness at which they could afford their goods there." Although after the Conquest the two sides of Lake Ontario and of the St. Lawrence generally were no longer under different crowns, the previous rivalry between the two routes, the St. Law- rence and Mohawk river routes, to the seaboard continued; and it was plainly to the interest of those who desired the aggrandise- ment of Albany and New York to the detriment of Montreal and Quebec, to discourage serious trading enterprises with Indians on the northern side of the St. Lawrence waters. We have an ex- ample of this spirit in a " Journal of Indian Transactions at [Fort] Niagara, in the year 1767," published in the documentary History of New York (ii. 868, 8vo. ed.), in which Toronto is named, and a great chieftain from that region figures — in one respect, somewhat discreditably, however. We give the passage of the journal to which we refer. The document appears to have been drawn up by Norman M'Leod, an Indian agent, visiting Fort Niagara. "July 17th, [1767. J Arrived Wabacommegat, chief of the Mississagas. [He came from Toronto, as we shall presently see.] July 1 8th. Arrived Ashenshan, head-warrior of the Senecas, be- longing to the Caiadeon village. This day, Wabacommegat came to speak to me, but was so drunk that no one could understand him." Again: "July 19th. Had a small conference with Wabacom- megat. Present — Norman M'Leod, Esq.; Mr. Neil MacLean, Commissary of Provisions ; Jean Baptiste de Couagne, interpreter. Wabacommegat spoke first, and, after the usual compliments, told that as soon as he had heard of my arrival, he and his young men came to see me. He then asked me if I had any news, and de- sired I should tell all I had. Then he gave four strings of wam- pum. I then told them — Children, I am glad to see you. I am sent here by your father. Sir William Johnson, to take care of your trade, and to prevent abuses therein. I have no sort of news, for I suppose you have heard of the drunken Chippewas that killed an Englishman and wounded his wife very much, above Detroit ; th6y are sent down the country by consent and approbation of the head men of the nation. I am sorry to acquaint you that some Introductory. 1 5 of your nation that came here with Nan-i-bo-jou, killed a cow and a mare belonging to Captain Grant, on the other side of the river. I am persuaded that all here present think it was very wrong, and a very bad return for the many good offices done by the English in general towards them, and in particular by Captain Grant, who had that day fed the men that were guilty of the theft. I hope and desire that Wabacommegat and the rest of the chiefs and warriors here present, will do all in their power to discover the thief, and bring him in here to me the next time they return, that we may see what satisfaction he or they may give Captain Grant for the loss of his cattle. [I gave seven strings of wampum.] Chil- dren, I am sorry to hear you have permitted people to trade at Toronto. I hope you will prevent it for the future. All of you know the reason of this belt of wampum being left at this place. [I then showed them a large belt left here five or six years ago by Wabacommegat, by which belt he was under promise not to allow anybody whatever to carry on trade at Toronto.] Now, children, I have no more to say, but desire you to remember and keep close to all the promises you have made to your English father. You must not listen to any bad news. When you hear any, good or bad, come to me with it. You may depend upon it I shall always tell you the truth. [I gave four strings of wampum.] " Wabacommegat replied : ' Father, we have heard you with atten- tion. I think it was very wrong in the people to kill Captain Grant's cattle. I shall discover the men that did it, and will bring them in here in the fall. We will allow no more trade to be carried on at Toronto. As to myself, it is well known I don't approve of it, as I went with the interpreter to bring in those that were trading at that place. We go away this day, and hope our father will give us some provisions, rum, powder and shot, and we will bring you venison when we return.' I replied, it was not in my power to give them much, but as it was the first time I had the pleasure of speaking to them, they should have a little of what they wanted." In the January previous to the conference, two traders had been arrested at Toronto. Sir William Johnson, in a letter to Gen. Gage, writes thus, under date of January 1 2, 1 767. " Capt. Browne writes me that he has, at the request of Commissary Roberts, caused two traders to be apprehended at Toronto, where they were trading contrary to authority. I hope Lieut.-Gov. Carteton," 1 6 Toronto of Old. Sir William continues, " will, agreeable to the declaration in one of his letters, have them prosecuted and punished as an example to the rest. I am informed that there are several more from Canada trading with the Indians on the north side of Lake Ontario, and up along the rivers in that quarter, which, if not prevented, must en- tirely ruin the fair trader." In these extracts from the correspond- ence of Sir William Johnson, and from the Journal of transactions at Fort Niagara, in 1767, we are admitted, as we suspect, to a true view of the status of Toronto as a trading-post for a series of years after the conquest. It was, as we conceive, a place where a good deal of forestalling of the regular markets went on. Trappers and traders, acting without license, made such bargains as they could with individuals among the native bands frequenting the spot at particular seasons of the year. We do not suppose that any store-houses for the deposit of goods or peltries were maintained here after the conquest. In a MS. map, which we have seen, of about the date 1793, the site of the old Fort Rouill6 is marked by a group of wigwams of the usual pointed shape, with the inscrip- tion appended, " Toronto, an Indian village now deserted." In 1788 Toronto harbour was well and minutely described by J. Collins, Deputy Surveyor General, in a Report presented 00 to Lord Dorchester, Governor-General, on the Military Posts and Harbours on Lakes Ontario, Erie and Huron. " The Harbour of Toronto," Mr. Collins says, "is near two miles in length from the entrance on the west to the isthmus between it and a large morass on the eastward. The breadth of the entrance is about half a mile, but the navigable channel for vessels is only about 500 yards, having from three to three and a half fathoms water. The north or main shore, the whole length of the harbour, is a clay bank from twelve to twenty feet high, and rising gradually behind, ap- parently good land, and fit for settlement. The water is rather shoal near the shore, having but one fathom depth at one hundred yards distance, two fathoms at two hundred yards ; and when I sounded here, the waters of the Lake were very high. There is good and safe anchorage everywhere within the harbour, being either a soft or sandy bottom. The south shore is composed of a great number of sandhills and ridges, intersected with swamps and small creeks. It is of unequal breadths, being from a quarter of a mile to a mile wide across from the harbour to the lake, and runs in length to the east five or six miles. Through the middle of the isthmus before Introductory. 1 7 mentioned, or rather near the north shore, is a channel with two fathoms water, and in the morass there are other channels from one to two fathoms deep. From what has been said," Mr. Collins proceeds to observe, " it will appear that the harbour of Toronto is capacious, safe and well sheltered ; but the entrance being from the westward is a great disadvantage to it, as the prevailing winds are from that quarter ; and as this is a fair wind from hence down the Lake, of course it is that which vessels in general would take their departure from ; but they may frequently find it difficult to get out of the harbour. The shoalness of the north shore, as before re- marked, is also disadvantageous as to erecting wharfs, quays, &c. In regard to this place as a military post," Mr. Collins reports, " I do not see any very striking features to recommend it in that view ; but the best situation to occupy for the purpose of protecting the settlement and harbour would, I conceive, be on the point and near the entrance thereof" (The knoll which subsequently be- came the site of the Garrison of York, is probably intended. Gib- raltar point, on the opposite side of the entrance, where a block house was afterwards built, may also be glanced at.) The history of the site of Fort Toronto would probably have differed from what it has been, and the town developed there would- perhaps, have assumed at its outset a French rather than an Eng- lish aspect, had the expectations of three Lower Canadian gentle- men, in 179 1, been completely fulfilled. Under date of " Surveyor General's Office [Quebec], loth June, 1 791," Mr. Collins, Deputy Surveyor-General, writes to Mr. Augustus Jones, an eminent Deputy Provincial Surveyor, of whom we shall hear repeatedly, that " His Excellency, Lord Dorchester, has been pleased to order one thousand acres of land to be laid out at Toronto for Mr. Rocheblave ; and for Captain Lajor6e, and for Captain Bouchette seven hundred acres each, at the same place, which please to lay out accordingly," Mr. Collins says, " and report the same to this office with all convenient speed." We may suppose that these three French gentlemen became early aware of the spot likely to be selected for the capital of the contemplated Province of Upper Canada, and foresaw the advan- tages that might accrue from the possession of some broad acres there. Unluckily for them, however, delay occurred in the execu- tion of Lord Dorchester's order ; and in the meantime, the new Province was duly constituted, with a government and land-grant- B 1 8 Toronto of Old. ing department of its own ; and, under date of "Nassau [Niagara], June 15, 1792, Mr. Augustus Jones, writing to Mr. Collins, refers to his former communication in the following terms : — " Your order of the loth of June, 1791, for lands at Toronto, in favour of Mr. Rocheblave and others, I only received the other day ; and as the members of the Land Board think their power dissolved by our Governor's late Proclamation relative to granting of Lands in Upper Canada, they recommend it to me to postpone doing any- thing in respect of such order until I may receive some further in- structions." We hear no more of the order. Had M. Rocheblave, Captain Lajor6e and Captain Bouchette become legally seized of the lands assigned them at Toronto by Lord Dorchester, the occupants of building-lots in York, instead of holding in fee simple, would pro- bably have been burdened for many a year with some vexatious recognitions of quasi-seignorial rights. On Holland's great MS. map of the Province of Quebec, made in 1 79 1, and preserved in the Crown Lands Department of Onta- rio, the indentation in front of the mouth of the modern Humber river is entitled " Toronto Bay"; the sheet of water between the peninsula and the mainland is not named : but the peninsula itself is marked " Presqu'isle, Toronto ;" and an extensive rectan- gular tract, bounded on the sonth by '' Toronto Bay" and the waters within the peninsula, is inscribed " Toronto." In Mr. Che- wett's MS. Journal, we have, under date of Quebec, April 22, 1792, the following entry : "Received from Gov. Simcoe a Plan of Points Henry and Frederick, to have a title page put to them : also a plan of the Town and township of Toronto, and to know whether it was ever laid out." We gather from this that sometime prior to Governor Simcoe's arrival, it had been in contemplation to establish a town at Toronto. The name Toronto pleased the ear and tooik the fancy of senti- mental writers. We have it introduced by an author of this class, in a work, entitled " Voyage dans la Haute Pensylvanie et dans I'Etat de New York, par un Membre adoptif de la nation Oneida ;" published at Paris in 1801, but written prior to 1799, as it is inscribed to Washington. The author describes a Council pre- tended to be held at Onondaga, where chiefs and sachems speak. They discourse of the misery of man, of death, of the ravages of the small-pox. Siasconcet, one of the siges. Introductory. 19 relates his interview with Kahawabash, who had lost his wife and all his friends by the prevailing malady. Siasconcet ex- horts him to suffer in silence like a wise man. Kahawabash re- plies, " Siasconcet ! n'astu pas souvent entendu les cris plaintifs de I'ours, dont la compagne avoit 6t6 tu6e ? N'as-tu pas souvent vu couler les larmes des yeux du castor qui avait perdu sa femelle ou ses petits ? Eh bien ! moi, suis-je inferieur k I'ours ou au castor ? Non : je suis homnie, aussi bon chasseur, aussi brave guerrier que tes sachems : comment empScher 1' arc de s'6tendre quand la corde casse ? La cime du ch^ne ou la tige du roseau de ployer, quand I'orage delate ? Lorsque le corps est bless6, Sias- concet, il en d6coule du sang ; quand le coeur est navr6, il en d6- coule des larmes : voila ce que je dirai k tes vieillards ; je verrai ce qu'ils me repondront." In the reply of Siasconcet, we have the reference to Toronto to which we have alluded, and which somewhat startled us when we suddenly lighted upon it in the work above-named. " Eh, bien !" Siasconcet said : " eh, bien ! Kahawabash, pleure sous mon toit, puisque ton bon g^nie le veut, et pour plaire au mauvais, que tes yeux soient sees quand tu seras au feu d'Onondaga." "Que faut-il done faire sur la terre," rejoined Kahawabash, "puisque I'un veut ce que I'autrene veut pas?" "Que faut-il faire?" answered Sias- concet, "consid6rer la vie commeun passage de Toronto k Niagara. Que de diflficult6s n'6prouvons-pas nous pour doubler les caps, pour sortirdesbaies dans lesquelles les vents nous for9entd'entrer? Quede chances contre d'aussi freles canots que les ndtres ? If faut cepen- dant prendre le temps et les choses comme ils viennent, puisque nous ne pouvons pas les choisir ; il faut nourrir, aimer sa femme et ses enfans, respecter sa tribu et sa nation ; jouir du bien quand il nous 6cheoit ; supporter le mal avec courage et patience ; chasser et p6cher quand on a faim, se reposer et fumer quand on est las ; s'attendre a rencontrer le malheur puisque on est n6 ; se r^jouir quand il ne vient pas ; se consid6rer comme des oiseaux perch6s pour la nuit sur la branche d'un arbre, et qui, au point du jour, s'envolent et disparaissent pour toujours." Familiar with the modern two-hours' pleasure-trip from Toronto to Niagara, we were, for the moment unprepared for the philoso- phic sachem's illustration of the changes and chances of mortal life. We forgot what an undertaking that journey was in the days of the primitive birch canoe, when in order to accomplish the pas- 20 Toronto of Old. sage, the whole of the western portion of Lake Ontario, was wont to be cautiously and laboriously coasted. The real name ol the author of the " Voyage dans la Haute Pensylvanie" was Saint-Jean de Crfevecoeur. To the narrative just given is appended information, which, if superfluous, will nevertheless be read locally now, with some curi- osity. The note explains that Toronto and Niagara, are " postes considerables de I'Ontario : le premier, situ6 k V ouest de ce lac, est form6 par une bale profonde et commode, ou le Gouvernement Anglais a fait construire un chantier, et une ville k laquelle on a donn6 le nom d'York ; le second, situ6 au sud-ouest, est forin6 par I'embouchure de la riviere Niagara, k Test de laquelle est la forteresse du m^me nom, et a I'ouest la pointe des Missisagu6s, sur laquelle on construit une nouvelle ville, destinde k Strc la capitale du Haut Canada." The annotator speaks, we see, of the town on Mississaga point and the other new town on the opposite side of the lake in the same terms : both are in process of construction ; and the town on Mississaga point, he still thinks is destined to be the capital of Upper Canada. The language of the note recalls the agitation in the public mind at Niagara in 1796, on the subject of the seat of Government for 1796. UPP^"^ Canada— a question that has since agitated Ca- nada in several of its sub-sections. The people ot Nia- gara in 1796, being in possession, naturally thought that the distinction ought to continue with them. Governor Simcoe had ordered the removal of the public offices to the infant York: there to abide, however, only temporarily, until the West should be peopled, and a second London built, on a Canadian Thames. Lord Dorchester, the Governor-in-Chief, at Quebec, held that Kingston ought to have been preferred, but that place, like Niagara, was, it was urged, too near the frontier incase of war. In 1796, Governor Simcoe had withdrawn from the country, and the people of Nia- gara entertained hopes that the order for removal might still be revoked. The policy of the late Governor, however, continued to be carried out. Three years previously, viz., in 1793, the site of the trading post known as Toronto had been occupied by the troops drawn from jygj Niagara and Queenston. At noon on t!ie 2 7th of August in 1793, the first royal salute had been fired from the gar- Introductcry. 2 1 risen there, and responded to by the shipping in the harbour, in commemoration of the change of name from Toronto to York — a change intended to please the old king, George III., through a compliment offered to his soldier son, Frederick, Duke of York. For some time after 1793, official letters and other contempo- rary records exhibit in their references to the new site, the expres- sions, " Toronto, now York," and " York, late Toronto." The ancient appellation was a favorite, and continued in ordinary use. Isaac Weld, who travelled in North America in 1795-7, still speaks in his work of the transfer of the Govern- ment from Niagara to Toronto. " Niagara," he says, " is the centre of the beau monde of Upper Canada : orders, however," he continues, " had been issued before our arrival there for the removal of the Seat of Government from thence to Toronto, which was deemed a more eligible spot for the meeting of the Legisla- tive bodies, as being farther removed from the frontiers of the United States. This projected change," he adds, " is by no means relished by the people at large, as Niagara is a much more con- venient place of resort to most of them than Toronto ; and as the Governor, who proposed the measure, has been removed, it is imagined that it will not be put in execution." In 1803-4, Thomas Moore, the distinguished poet, travelled on this continent. The record of his tour took the form, not of a jour- nal in prose, but of a miscellaneous collection of verses „ suggested by incidents and scenes encountered. These pieces, addressed many of them to friends, appear now as a sub- division of his collected works, as Poems relating to America. The society of the United States in 1804 appears to have -been very distasteful to him. He speaks of his experience somewhat as we may imagine the winged Pegasus, if endowed with speech, would have done of his memorable brief taste of sublunary life. Writing to the Hon. W. R. Spencer, from Buffalo, — which he ex- plains to be "a little village on Lake Erie," — in a strain resembling that of the poetical satirists of the century which had just passed away, he sweepingly declares — " Take Christians, Mohawks, Democrats, and all, From the rude wigwam to the congress-hall. From man the savage, whether slav'd or free, To man the civilized, less tame than he, — 'Tis one dull chaos, one unfertile strife 2 2 Toronto of Old. Betwixt half-polished and half-barbarous life ; Where every ill the ancient world could brew Is mixed with every grossness of the new ; Where all corrupts, though little can entice, And nought is known of luxury, but its vice ! " He makes an exception in a note appended to these lines, in favour of the Dennies and their friends at Philadelphia, with whom he says, " I passed the few agreeable moments which my tour through the States afforded me." These friends he thus apostro- phises : — " Yet, yet forgive me, oh ! ye sacred few, Whom late by Delaware's green banks T knew : Whom known and loved thro' many a social eve, 'Twas bliss to live with, and 'twas pain to leave. Not with more joy the lonely exile scann'd The writing traced upon the desert's sand. Where his lone heart but little hoped to find One trace of life, one stamp of human kind. Than did I hail the pure, th' enlightened zeal. The strength to reason and the warmth to feel. The manly polish and the illumined taste. Which, 'mid the melancholy, hearties waste. My foot has traversed, oh ! you sacred few, I found by Delaware's green banks with you. " After visiting the Falls of Niagara, Moore passed down Lake Ontario, threaded his way through the Thousand Islands, shot the Long Sault and other rapids, and spent some days in Montreal. The poor lake-craft which in 1804 must have accommodated the poet, may have put in at the harbour of York. He certainly alludes to a tranquil evening scene on the waters in that quarter, and notices the situation of the ancient "Toronto." Thus he sings in some verses addressed to Lady Charlotte Rawdon, " from the banks of the St. Lawrence.'' (He refers to the time when he was last in her company, and says how improbable it then was that he should ever stand upon the shores of America) : " I dreamt not then that ere the rolling year Had filled its circle, I should wander here In musing awe ; should tread this wondrous world. See all its store of inland waters hurl'd In one vast volume down Niagara's steep. Or calm behold them, in transparent sleep. Introductory. 23 Where the blue hills of old Toronto shed Their evening shadows o'er Ontario's bed ; Should trace the grand Cadaraqui, and glide Down the white rapids of his lordly tide, Through massy woods, 'mid islets flowering fair. And blooming glades, where the first sinful pair For consolation might have weeping trod, When banished from the garden of their God." We can better picture to ourselves the author of Lalla Rookh floating on the streams and other waters " of Ormus and of Ind," constructing verses as he journeys on, than we can of the same personage on the St. Lawrence in 1804 similarly engaged. " The Canadian Boat Song " has become in its words and air almost a " national anthem " amongst us. It was written, we are assured, at St. Anne's, near the junction of the Ottawa and the St. Law- rence. Toronto should be duly appreciative of the distinction of having been named by Moore. The look and sound of the word took his fancy, and he doubtless had pleasure in introducing it in his verses addressed to Lady Rawdon. It will be observed that while Moore gives the modern pronunciation of Niagara, and not the older, as Goldsmith does ui his " Traveller," he obliges us to pronounce Cataraqui in an unusual manner. Isaac Weld, it will have been noticed, also preferred the name Toronto, in the passage from his Travels just now given, though writing after its alteration to York. The same traveller moreover indulges in the following general strictures : " It is to be lamented that the Indian names, so grand and sonorous, should ever have been changed for others. Newark, Kingston, York, are poor sub- stitutes for the original names of the respective places, Niagara, Cataraqui, Toronto." " Dead vegetable matter made the humus ; into that the roots of the living tree were struck, and because there had been vegetation in the past, there was vegetation in the future- And so it was with regard to the higher life of a na- tion. Unless there was a past to which it could refer, there would not be in it any high sense of its own mission in the world. . . . They did not want to bring the old times back again, but they would understand the present around them far better if they would trace the present back into the past, see what it arose out of, what it had been the development of, and what it con- tained to serve for the future before them. ^'—Bishop of Winchester to the Ar- ehteological Institute, at Southampton, Aug. 1872. TORONTO OF OLD. PALACE STREET TO THE MARKET PLACE. N Rome, at the present day, the parts that are the most attractive to the tourist of archaeological tastes, are those that are the most desolate ; quarters that, apart from their associations, are the most uninviting. It is the same with many another venerable town of ' world beyond the Atlantic, of far less note than the old Imperial capital, with Avignon, for example ; with Nismes and Vienne in France ; with Paris itself, also, to some extent ; with Chester, and York, and St. Albans, the Verulam of the Roman period, in England. It is the same with our American towns, wherever any relics of their brief past are extant. Detroit, we remember, had once a quaint, dilapidated, primaeval quarter. It is the same with our own Toronto. He that would examine the vestiges of the original settlement, out of which the actual town has grown, must betake himself, in the first instance, to localities now deserted by fashion, and be content to contemplate objects that, to the indifferent eye, will seem commonplace and insignificant. To invest such places and things with any degree of interest will appear difficult. An attempt in that direction may even be pro- nounced visionary. Nevertheless, it is a duty which we owe to our forefathers to take what note we can of the labours of their hands ; to forbid, so far as we may, the utter oblivion of their early efforts, and deeds, and sayings, the outcome of their ideas, of their humours and anxieties ; to forbid, even, so far as we may, the utter oblivion of the form and fashion of their persons. 26 Toronto of Old. [§ i. The excavations which the first inhabitants made in the con- struction of their dweUings and in engineering operations, civil and military, were neither deep nor extensive ; the materials which they employed were, for the most part, soft and perishable. In a few years all the original edifices of York, the infant Toronto, together with all the primitive delvings and cuttings, will, of necessity, have vanished. Natural decay will have destroyed some. Winds, fires, and floods will have removed others. The rest will have been de- liberately taken out of the way, or obliterated in the accomplish- ment of modern improvements, the rude and fragile giving way be- fore the commodious and enduring. At St. Petersburg, we believe, the original log-hut of Peter the Great is preserved to the present day, in a casing of stone, with a kind of religious reverence. And in Rome of old, through the in- fluence of a similar sacred regard for the past, the lowly cottage of Romulus was long protected in a similar manner. There are pro- bably no material relics of our founders and forefathers which we should care'to invest with a like forced and artificial perma- nence. But memorials of those relics, and records of the associa- tions that may here and there be found to cluster round them, — these we may think it worth our while to collect and cherish. Overlooking the harbour of the modern Toronto, far down in the east, there stands at the present day, a large structure of grey cut-stone. Its radiating wings, the turret placed at a central point aloft, evidently for the ready oversight of the subjacent premises ; the unornamented blank walls, pierced high up in each storey with a row of circular-heading openings, suggestive of shadowy corridors and cells within, all help to give to this pile an unmistakable pri- son-aspect. It was very nearly on the site of this rather hard-featured build- ing that the first Houses of Parliament of Upper Canada were placed — humble but commodious structures of wood, built before the close of the eighteenth century, and destroyed by the incen- diary hand of the invader in 1813. " They consisted," as a con- temporary document sets forth, " of two elegant Halls, with con- venient offices, for the accommodation of the Legislature and the Courts of Justice."—" The Library, and all the papers and records belonging to these institutions were consumed, and, at the same time," the , document adds, " the Church was robbed, and the Town Library totally pillaged."— The injuries thus inflicted were § I.] (Palace Street to the Market (Place. 27 a few months afterwards avenged by the destruction of the Public Buildings at Washington, by a British force. " We consi- der," said an Address of the Legislative Council of Lower Canada to Sir George Prevost, " the destruction of the Public Buildings at Washington as a just retribution for the outrages committed by an American force at the seat of Government of Upper Canada." On the same site succeeded the more conspicuous and more capacious, but still plain and simply cubical brick block erected for legislative purposes in 1818, and accidentally burned in 1824. The conflagration on this occasion entailed a loss which, the Canadian Review of the period, published at Montreal, observes, " in the present state of the finances and debt of the Province, cannot be considered a trifling affair." That loss, we are informed by the same authority, amounted to the sum of two thousand pounds. Hereabout the Westminster of the new capital was expected to be. It is not improbable that the position at the head, rather than the entrance, of the harbour was preferred, as being at once com- manding and secure. The appearance of the spot in its primaeval condition, was doubt- less more prepossessing than we can now conceive it ever to have been. Fine groves of forest trees may have given it a sheltered look, and, at the same time, have screened off from view the ad- joining swamps. The language of the early Provincial Gazetteer, published by au- thority, is as follows: "The Don empties itself into the har- bour, a Httle above the Town, running through a marsh, which when drained, will afford most beautiful and fruitful meadows." In the early manuscript Plans, the same sanguine opinion is recorded, in regard to the morasses in this locality. On one, of 1810, now before us, we have the inscription : " Natural Meadow which may be mown." On another, the legend runs: "Large Marsh, and will 'in time make good Meadows." On a third it is: " Large Marsh and Good Grass." At all events, hereabout it was that York, capital of Upper Ca- nada, began to rise. To the west and north of the site of the Houses of Parliament, the officials of the Government, with mer- chants and tradesmen in the usual variety, began to select lots and put up convenient dwellings; whilst close by, at Berkeley Street or Parliament Street as the southern portion of the modern Berkeley 28 Toronto of Old. [§ i. Street was then named, the chief thoroughfare of the town had its commencing-point. Growing slowly westward from here, King Street developed in its course, in the customary American way, its hotel, its tavern, its boarding-house, its waggon-factory, its tin- smith shop, its bakery, its general store, its lawyer's office, its print- ing office, its places of worship. Eastward of Berkeley Street, King Street became the Kingston Toad, trending slightly to the north, and then proceeding in a straight line to a bridge over the Don. This divergency in the highway caused a number of the lots on its northern side to be awkwardly bounded on their southern ends by lines that formed with their sides, alternately obtuse and acute angles, productive of •corresponding inconveniencies in the shapes of the buildings after- wards erected thereon ; and in the position of some of them. At one particular point the houses looked as if they had been sepa- rated from each other and partially twisted round, by the jolt of an earthquake. At the Bridge, the lower Kingston road, if produced westward in a right line, would have been Queen Street, or Lot Street, had it been deemed expedient to clear a passage in that direction through the forest. But some way westward from the Bridge, in this line, a ravine was encountered lengthwise, which was held to present great engineering difficulties. A road cut diagonally from the Bridge to the opening of King Street, at once avoided this natural impediment, and also led to a point where an easy connection was made with the track for wheels, which ran along the shore of the harbour to the Garrison. But for the ravine alluded to, which now appears to the south of Moss Park, Lot Street, or, which is the same thing. Queen Street, would at an early period, have begun to dis- pute with King Street, its claim to be the chief thoroughfare of York. But to come back to our original unpromising stand-point. Objectionable as the first site of the Legislative Buildings at York may appear to ourselves, and alienated as it now is to lower uses, we cannot but gaze upon it with a certain degree of emotion, when we remember that here it was the first skirmishes took place in the great war of principles which afterwards with such determi- nation and effect was fought out in Canada. Here it was that first loomed up before the minds of our early law-makers the ecclesias- tical question, the educational question, the constitutional question. Here it was that first was heard the open discussion, childlike, in- § I.] (Palace Street to the Market (Place. 29 deed, and vague, but pregnant with very weighty consequences, of topics, social and national, which, at the time, even in the parent state itself, were mastered but by few. Here it was, during a period of twenty-seven years (i 797-1824), at each opening and closing of the annual session, amidst the firing of cannon and the commotion of a crowd, the cavalcade drew up that is wont, from the banks of the Thames to the remotest colony of England, to mark the solemn progress of the sovereign or the sovereign's representative, to and from the other Estates in Parliament assembled. Here, amidst such fitting surroundings of state, as the circumstances of the times and the place admitted, came and went personages of eminence, whose names are now familiar in Canadian story : never, indeed, the founder and organ- iser of Upper Canada, Governor Simcoe himself, in this formal and ceremonious manner ; although often must he have visited the spot otherwise, in his personal examinations of every portion of his young capital and its environs. But here, immediately after him, however, came and went repeatedly, in due succession. President Russell, Governor Hunter, Governor Gore, General Brock, Gene- ral Sheafife, Sir Gordon Drummond, Sir Peregrine Maitland. And, while contemplating the scene of our earliest political con- flicts, the scene of our earliest known state pageants in these parts, with their modest means and appliances, our minds intuitively recur to a period farther removed still, when under even yet more primitive conditions the Parliament of Upper Canada assembled at Newark, just across the Lake. We picture to ourselves the group of seven crown-appointed Councillors and five representatives of the Com- mons, assembled there, with the first Speaker, McDonell, of Glen-_ gary ; all plain, unassuming, prosaic men, listening, at their first session, to the opening speech of their frank and honoured Gover- nor. We see them adjourning to the open air from their straight- ened chamber at Navy Hall, and conducting the business of the young Province under the shade of a spreading tree, introducing the English Code and Trial by Jury, decreeing Roads, and pro- hibiting the spread of Slavery ; while a boulder of the drift, lifting itself up through the natural turf, serves as a desk for the recording clerk. Below them, in the magnificent estuary of the river Niagara, the waters of all the Upper Lakes are swiriing by, not yet recovered from the agonies of the long gorge above, and the leap at Table Rock. — Even here, at the opening and close of this pri- 30 Toronto of Old. [§ i . mseval Legislature, some of the decent ceremonial was observed with which, as we have just said, the sadly inferior site at the em- bouchure of the Don became afterwards familiar. We learn this from the narrative of the French Duke de Liancourt, who affords us a glimpse of the scene at Newark on the occasion of a Parliament therein 1795. "The whole retinue of the Governor," he says, " consisted in a guard of fifty men of the garrison of the fort. Draped in silk, he entered the Hall with his hat on his head, attended by his adjutant and two secretaries. The two members of the Legislative Council gave, by their speaker, notice of it to the Assembly. Five members of the latter having appeared at the bar, the Governor delivered a speech, modelled after that of the King, on the political affairs of Europe, on the treaty concluded with the United States (Jay's treaty of 1 794), which he mentioned in expres- sions very favourable to the Union ; and on the peculiar concerns of Canada.'' (Travels, i. 258.) By the Quebec Act, passed in 1791, it was enacted that the Legislative Council for Upper Canada should consist of not fewer than seven members, and the Assembly of not less than sixteen members, who were to be called together at least once in every year. To account for the smallness of the attendance on the occa- sion just described, the Duke explains that the Governor had de- ferred the session " on account of the expected arrival of a Chief Justice, who was to come from England : and from a hope that he should be able to acquaint the members with the particulars of the Treaty with the United States. But the harvest had now begun, which, in a higher degree than elsewhere, engages in Canada the piibHc attention, far beyond what state affairs can do. Two mem- bers of the Legislative Council were present, instead of seven ; no Chief Justice appeared, who was to act as Speaker ; instead of sixteen members of the Assembly, five only attended ; and this was the whole number that could be collected at this time. The law required a greater number of members for each house, to dis- cuss and determine upon any business ; but within two days a year would have expired since the last session. The Governor, there- fore, thought it right to open the session, reserving, however, to either house the right of proroguing the sitting, from one day to another, in expectation that the ships from Detroit and Kingston would either bring the members who were yet wanting, or certain intelligence of their not being able to attend." § I.] (Palace Street to the Market fPlace. 31 But again to return to the Houses of Parliament at York.— Extending from the grounds which surrounded the buildings, in the east, all the way to the fort at the entrance of the harbour, in the west, there was a succession of fine forest trees, especially oak; underneath and by the side of which the upper surface of the pre- cipitous but nowhere very elevated cliff was carpeted with thick green-sward, such as is still to be seen between the old and new gar- risons, or at Mississaga Point at Niagara. A fragment, happily preserved, of the ancient bank, is to be seen in the ornamental piece of ground known as the Fair-green ; a strip of land first pro- tected by a fence, and planted with shrubbery at the instance of ^Ir. George Monro, when Mayor, who also, in front of his property some distance further on, long guarded from harm a solitary sur- vivor of the grove that once fringed the harbour. On our first visit to Southampton, many years ago, we remem- ber observing a resemblance between the walk to the river Itchen, shaded by trees and commanding a wide water-view on the south, and the margin of the harbour of York. In the interval between the points where now Princes Street and Caroline Street descend to the water's edge, was a favourite land- ing-place for the small craft of the bay — a wide and clean gravelly beach, with a convenient ascent to the cliff above. Here, on fine mornings, at the proper season, skiffs and canoes, log and birch- bark, were to be seen putting in, weighed heavily down with fish, speared or otherwise taken during the preceding night, in the lake, bay, or neighbouring river. Occasionally a huge sturgeon would be landed, one struggle of which might suffice to upset a small boat. Here were to be purchased in quantities, salmoil, pickerel, masquelonge, whitefish and herrings ; with the smaller fry of perch, bass and sunfish. Here, too, would be displayed unsightly catfish, suckers, lampreys, and other eels ; and sometimes lizards, young alligators for size. Specimens, also, of the curious steel- clad, inflexible, vicious-looking pipe-fish were not uncommon. About the submerged timbers of the wharves this creature was often to be seen — at one moment stationary and still, like the dragon-fly or humming-bird poised on the wing, then, like those nei-vous denizens of the air, giving a sudden dart off to the right or left, without curving its body. Across the bay, from this landing-place, a little to the eastward, was the narrowest part of the peninsula, a neck of sand, destitute 32 Toronto of Old. [§ i. of trees, known as the portage or carrying-place, where, from time immemorial, canoes and small boats were wont to be transferred to and from the lake. Along the bank, above the landing-place, Indian encampments were occasionally set up. Here, in comfortless wigwams, we have seen Dr. Lee, a medical man attached to the Indian department, administering from an ordinary tin cup, nauseous but salutary draughts to sick and convalescent squaws. It was the duty of Ur. Lee to visit Indian settlements and prescribe for the sick. In the discharge of his duty he performed long journeys, on horse- back, to Penetanguishene and other distant posts, carrying with him his drugs and apparatus in saddle-bags. When advanced in years, and somewhat disabled in regard to activity of movement,. Dr. Lee was attached to the Parliamentary staff as Usher of the Black Rod. — The locality at which we are glancing suggests the name of another never-to-be-forgotten medical man, whose home and property were close at hand. This is the eminent surgeon and physician, Christopher Widmer. It is to be regretted that Dr. Widmer left behind him no written memorials of his long and varied experience. Before his settle- ment in York, he had been a staff cavalry surgeon, on active ser- vice during the campaigns in the Peninsula. A personal narrative of his public life would have been full of interest. But his ambi- tion was content with the homage of his contemporaries, rich and poor, rendered with sincerity to his pre-eminent abiUties and inex- tinguishable zeal as a surgeon and physician. Long after his retire- ment from general practice, he was every day to be seen passing to and from the old Hospital on King Street, conveyed in his well- known cabriolet, and guiding with his own hand the reins con- ducted in through the front window of the vehicle. He had now attained a great age ; but his slender form continued erect ; the hat was worn jauntily, as in other days, and the dress was ever scrupulously exact ; the expression of the face in repose was some- what abstracted and sad, but a quick smile appeared at thfc recog- nition of friends. The ordinary engravings of Harvey, the dis- coverer of the circulation of the blood, recall in some degree the countenance of Dr. Widmer. Within the General Hospital, a por- trait of him is appropriately preserved. One of the earliest, and at the same time one of the most graceful lady-equestrians ever seen in York was this gentleman's accomplished wife. At a later I I.] (Palace Street to the Market (Place. 33 period a sister of Mr. Justice Willis was also conspicuous as a skil- ful and fearless horse-woman. The description in the Percy Anec- -dotes of the Princess Amelia, youngest daughter of George II., is curiously applicable to the last-named lady, who united to the amiable peculiarities indicated, talents and virtues of the highest •order. " She," the brothers Sholto and Reuben say, " was of a masculine turn of mind, and evinced this strikingly enough in her ■dress and manners : she generally wore a riding-habit in the Ger- man fashion with a round hat; and delighted very much in attending her stables, particularly when any of the horses were out •of order." At a phenomenon such as this, suddenly appearing in their midst, the staid and simple-minded society of York stood for a while aghast. In the Loyalist of Nov. 15, 1828, we have the announcement of a Medical partnership entered into between Dr. Widmer and Dr. Diehl. It reads thus : " Doctor Widmer, finding his professional engagements much extended of late, and occasionally too arduous for one person, has been induced to enter into partnership with Doctor Diehl, a respectable practitioner, late of Montreal. It is expected that their united exertions will prevent in future any dis- appointment to Dr. Widmer's friends, both in Town and Country. Dr. Diehl's residence is at present at Mr. Hayes' Boarding-house. York, Oct. 28, 1828." Dr. Diehl died at Toronto, March 5, 1868. At the south-west corner of Princes Street^ near where we are now supposing ourselves to be, was a building popularly known as Russell Abbey. It was the house of the Hon. Peter Russell, and, after his decease, of his maiden sister. Miss Elizabeth Russell, a lady of great refinement, who survived her brother many years. The edifice, like most of the early homes of York, was of one storey only ; but it exhibited in its design a degree of elegance and some peculiarities. To a central building were attached wings with gables to the south : the windows had each an architectural deco- ration or pediment over it. It was this feature, we believe, that was supposed to give to the place something of a monastic air ; to entitle it even to the name of " Abbey." In front, a dwarf stone wall with a light wooden paling surrounded a lawn, on which grew tall acacias or locusts. Mr. Russell was a remote scion of the Bedford Russells. He apparently desired to lay the foundation of a solid landed estate in Upper Canada. His position as Admi- nistrator, on the departure of the first Governor of the Province, C 34 Toronto of Old. [§ i, gave him facilities for the selection and acquisition of wild lands. The duality necessarily assumed in the wording of the Patents by which the Administrator made grants to himself, seems to have been regarded by some as having a touch of the comic in it. Hence among the early people of these parts the name of Peter RusselL was occasionally to be heard quoted good-humouredly, not mal- ignantly, as an example of "the man who would do well unto him- self" On the death of Mr. Russell, his property passed into the hands of his sister, who bequeathed the whole to Dr. William Warren Baldwin, into whose possession also came the valuable family plate, elaborately embossed with the armorial bearings of the Russells. Russell Hill, long the residence of Admiral Augus- tus Baldwin, had its name from Mr. Russell , and in one of the elder branches of the Baldwin family, Russell is continued as a baptismal name. In the same family is also preserved an interest- ing portrait of Mr. Peter Russell himself, from which we can see that he was a gentleman of portly presence, of strongly marked features, of the Thomas Jefferson type. We shall have occasion hereafter to speak frequently of Mr. Russell. Russell Abbey became afterwards the residence of Bishop Mac- donell, a universally-respected Scottish Roman Catholic ecclesias- tic, whose episcopal title was at first derived from Rhesina in par- tibus, but afterwards from our Canadian Kingston, where his home usually was. His civil duties, as a member of the Legislative Council of Upper Canada, required his presence in York during the Parliamentary sessions. We have in our possession a fine mez- zotint of Sir M. A. Shee's portrait of Bishop Macdonell. It used to be supposed by some that the occupancy of Russell Abbey by- the Bishop caused the portion of Front Street which lies eastward of the Market-place, to be denominated Palace Street. But the name appears in plans of York of a date many years anterior tO' that occupancy. In connection with this mention of Bishop Macdonell, it may be of some interest to add that, in 1826, Thomas Weld, of Lul- worth Castle, Dorsetshire, was consecrated as his coadjutor, in England, under the title of Bishop of Amylse. But it does not appear that he ever came out to Canada. (This was afterwards the well-known English Cardinal.) He had been a layman, and married, up to the year 1825 ; when, on the death of his wife, he took orders ; and in one year he was, as just stated, made a Bishop. § I.] (Palacs Street to the Market (Place. 35 Russell Abbey may indeed have been styled the " Palace" ; but it was probably from being the residence of one who for three years administered the Government ; or the name " Palac; Street" itself may have suggested the appellation. " Palace Street" was no doubt intended to indicate the fact that it led "directly to the Government reservation at the end of the Town on which the Par- liament houses were erected, and where it was supposed the " Pa- lais du Gouvernement," the official residence of the representative of the Sovereign in the Province would eventually be. On an Official Plan of this region, of the year 1810, the Parliament Buildings themselves are styled " Government House." At the laying out of York, however, we find, from the plans, that the name given in the first instance to the Front street of the town was, not Palace Street, but King Street. Modern King Street was then Duke Street, and modern Duke Street, Duchess Street. These street names were intended as loyal compliments to members of the reigning family ; to George the Third ; to his son the popular Duke of York, from whom, as we shall learn here- after, the town itself was named ; to the Duchess of York, the eldest daughter of the King of Prussia. In the cross streets the same chivalrous devotion to the Hanoverian dynasty was exhibited. George street, the boundary westward of the first nucleus of York, bore the name of the heir-apparent, George, Prince of Wales. The next street eastward was honoured with the name of his next brother, Frederick, the Duke of York himself. And the succeeding street eastward, Caroline Street, had imposed upon it that of the Princess of Wales, afterwards so unhappily famous as George the Fourth's Queen CaroUne. Whilst in Princes Street (for such is the correct orthography, as the old plans show, and not Princess Street, as is generally seen now,) the rest of the male members of the royal family were collectively commemorated, namely, the Duke of Clarence, the Duke of Kent, the Duke of Cumberland, the Duke of Sussex, and the Duke of Cambridge. When the Canadian town of York was first projected, the mar- riage of the Duke of York with the daughter of the King of Prus- sia, Frederica Charlotta Ulrica, had only recently been celebrated at Berlin. It was considered at the time an event of importance, and the ceremonies on the occasion are given with some minute- ness in the Annual Register for 1791. We are there informed that " the supper was served at six tables ; that the first was placed 36 Toronto of Old. [§ i. under a canopy of crimson velvet, and the victuals (as the record terras them) served on gold dishes and plates ; that Lieutenant- General Bornstedt and Count Bruhl had the honour to carve, without being seated , that the other five tables, at which sat the generals, ministers, ambassadors, all the officers of the Court, and the high nobility, were served in other apartments ; that supper being over, the assembly repaired to the White Hall, where the trumpet, timbrel, and other music, were playing ; that the flambeau dance was then began, at which the ministers of state carried the torches ; that the new couple were attended to their apartment by the reigning Queen and the Queen dowager ; that the Duke of York wore on this day the English uniform, and the Princess Pre- derica a suit of drap d'argent, ornamented* with diamonds." In Ashburton's " New and Complete History of England, from the first settlement of Brutus, upwards of one thousand years before Julius Caesar, to the year 1793," now lying before us, two full-length portraits of the Duke and Duchess are given. — New York and Albany, in the adjoining State, had their names from titles of a Duke of York in 1664, afterwards James H. His brother, Charles II., made him a present, by Letters Patent, of all the territory, from the western side of the Connecticut river to the east side of Delaware Bay ; that is, of the present States of Connecticut, New York, Delaware, and New Jersey. On the green sward of the bank between Princes street and George Street, the annual military " Trainings" on the Fourth of June, " the old King's birthday," were wont to take place. At a later period the day of meeting was the 23rd of April, St. George's day, the f@te of George IV. Military displays on a grand scale in and about Toronto have not been uncommon in modern times, exciting the enthusiasm of the multitude that usually assembles on such occasions. But in no way inferior in point of interest to the unsophisticated youthful eye, half a century ago, unaccustomed to anything more elaborate, were those motley musterings of the militia companies. The costume of the men may have been va- rious, the fire-arms only partially distributed, and those that were to be had not of the brightest hue, nor of the mpst scientific make; the lines may not always have been perfectly straight, nor their constituents well matched in height ; the obedience to the word of command may not have been rendered with the mechanical precision which we admire at reviews now, nor with that total sup- § T.] fPalace Street to the Market (Place. 37 pression of dialogue in undertone in the ranks, nor with that absence of remark interchanged between the men and their officers that are customary now. Nevertheless, as a military spec- tacle, these gatherings and manoeuvres on the grassy bank here, were effective ; they were always anticipated with pleasure and contemplated with satisfaction. The officers on these occasions, — some of them mounted — were arrayed in uniforms of antique cut ; in red coats with wide black breast lappets and broad tail flaps ; high collars, tight sleeves and large cuffs ; on the head a black hat, the ordinary high-crowned civilian hat, with a cylindri- cal feather some eighteen inches high inserted at the top, not in front, but on the left side (whalebone surrounded with feathers from the barnyard, scarlet at the base, white above). Animation was added to the scene by a drum and a few fifes executing with liveHness "The York Quickstep," "The Reconciliation," and "The British Grenadiers." And then, in addition to the local cavalry corps, there were the clattering scabbards, the blue jackets, and bear-skin helmets of Captain Button's dragoons from Markham and Whitchurch. Numerously, in the rank and file at these musterings — as well as among the officers, commissioned and non-commissioned — were to be seen men who had quite recently jeopardized their lives in the defence of the country. At the period we are speaking of, only some six or seven years had elapsed since an invasion of Canada from the south. " The late war," for a long while, very naturally, formed a fixed point in local chronology, from which times and seasons were calculated ; a fixed point, however, which, to the in- different new-comer, and even to the indigenous, who, when " the late war'' was in progress, were not in bodily existence, seemed already to belong to a remote past. An impression of the miseries of war, derived from the talk of those who had actually felt them, was very strongly stamped in the minds of the rising generation ; an impression accompanied also at the same time with the un- comfortable persuasion derived from the same source, that another conffict was inevitable in due time. The musterings on " Training- day" were thus invested with interest and importance in the minds of those who were summoned to appear on these occasions, as also in the minds of the boyish looker-on, who was aware that ere long he would himself be required by law to turn out and take his part in the annual militia evolutions, and perhaps afterwards, possibly 38 ' Toronto of Old. [§ i. at no distant hour, to handle the musket or wield the sword in earnest. A little further on, in a house at the north-west corner of Frede- rick Street, a building afterwards utterly destroyed by fire, was born, in 1804, the Hon. Robert Baldwin, son of Dr. William Warren Baldwin, already referred to, and Attorney-General in 1842 for Upper Canada. In the same building, at a later period, (and previously in an humble edifice, at the north-west corner of King Street and Caroline Street, now likewise wholly destroyed,) the foundation was laid, by well-directed and far-sighted ventures in commerce, of the great wealth (locally proverbial) of the Cawthra family, the Asters of Upper Canada, of whom more here- after. It was also in the same house, prior to its occupation by Mr. Cawthra, senior, that the printing operations of Mr. William Lyon Mackenzie were carried on at the time of the destruction of his press by a party of young men, who considered it proper to take some spirited notice of the criticisms on the public acts of their fathers, uncles and superiors generally, that appeared every week in the columns of the Colonial Advocate; a violent act memo- rable in the annals of Western Canada, not simply as having been the means of establishing the fortunes of an indefatigable and powerful journalist, but more notably as presenting an unconscious illustration of a general law, observable in the early development of communities, whereby an element destined to elevate and re- generate is, on its first introduction, resisted, and sought to be crushed physically, not morally ; somewhat as the white man's watch was dashed to pieces by the Indian, as though it had been a sentient thing, conspiring in some mysterious way with other things, to promote the ascendancy of the stranger. The youthful perpetrators of the violence referred to were not long in learning practically the futility of such exploits. Good old Mr. James Baby, on handing to his son Raymond the amount which that youth was required to pay as his share of the heavy damages awarded, as a matter of course, by the jury on the occa- sion, is said to have added : — " There ! go and make one great fool of yourself again !'' — a sarcastic piece of advice that might have been offered to each of the parties concerned. A few steps northward, on the east side of Frederick Street, was the first Post Office, on the premises of Mr. Allan, who was post- master ; and southward, where this street touches the water, was f I.] (Palace Street to the Market (Place. 39 the Merchants' Wharf, also the property of Mr. Allan ; and the Custom House, where Mr. Allan was the Collector. We gather also from Calendars of the day that Mr. Allan was likewise Inspec- tor of Flour, Pot and Pearl Ash; and Inspector of Shop, Still and Tavern Duties. In an early, limited condition of society, a man of more than the ordinary aptitude for affairs is required to act in many capacities. The Merchants' Wharf was the earliest landing-place for the larger craft of the lake. At a later period other wharves or long wooden jetties, extending out into deep water, one of them named theFarmers' Wharf, were builtwestward. In the shoal water between the several wharves, for a long period, there was annually a dense crop of rushes or flags. The town or county authorities incurred considerable expense, year after year, in endeavouring to eradicate them — but, like the heads of the hydra, they were always re-ap- pearing. In July, 182 1, a " Mr. Coles' account for his assistants' labour in destroying rushes in front of the Market Square," was laid before the County magistrates, and audited, amounting to £1^ 6s. T,d. In August of the same year, the minutes of the County Court record that " Capt. Macaulay, Royal Engineers, offered to cut down the rushes in front of the town between the Merchants' Wharf and Cooper's Wharf, for a sum not to exceed ninety dollars, which would merely be the expense of the men and materials in executing the undertaking : his own time he would give to the public on this occasion, as encouragement to others to endeavour to destroy the rushes when they become a nuisance /' it was accordingly ordered " that ninety dollars be paid to Capt. Macaulay or his order, for the purpose of cutting down the rushes, according to his verbal undertaking to cut down the same, to be paid out of the Police or District funds in the hands of the Trea- surer of the District." We have understood that Capt. Macaulay's measures for the extinction of the rank vegetation in the shallow waters of the har- bour, proved to be very efficient. The instrument used was a kind of screw grapnel, which, let down from the side of a large scow, laid hold of the rushes at their root and forcibly wrenched them out of the bed of mud below. The entire plant was thus lifted up, and -drawn by a windlass into the scow. When a full load of the aquatic weed was collected, it was taken out into the open water of the Lake, and there disposed of 40 Toronto of Old. [§ i. Passing on our way, we soon came to the Market Square. This was a large open space, with wooden shambles in the middle of it^ thirty-six feet long and twenty-four wide, running north and south. By a Proclamation in the Gazette of Nov. 3, 1803, Governor Hunter appointed a weekly market day for the Town of York, and also a place where the market should be held. " Peter Hunter, Esquire, Lieutenant-Governor, &c. Whereas great prejudice hath arisen to the inhabitants of the Town and Township of York, and of other adjoining Townships, from no place or day having been set apart or appointed for exposing publicly for sale, cattle, sheep, poultry, and other provisions, goods, and merchandize, brought by merchants, farmers, and others, for the necessary supply of the said Town of York ; and, whereas, great benefit and advantage might be derived to the said inhabitants and others, by establishing a weekly market within that Town, at a place and on a day certain for the purpose aforesaid ; " Know all men, That I, Peter Hunter, Esquire, Lieutenant- Governor of the said Province, taking the premises into considera- tion, and willing to promote the interest, and advantage, and accom- modation of the inhabitants of the Town and Township aforesaid, aud of others. His Majesty's subjects, within the said Province, by and with the advice of the Executive Council thereof, have ordained, erected, established and appointed, and do hereby ordain, erect, establish and appoint, a Public Open Market, to be held on Satur- day in each and every week during the year, within the said Town of York: — (The first market to be held therein on Saturday, the 5th day of November next after the date of these presents), on a certain piece or plot of land within that Town, consisting of five acres and a half, commencing at the south-east angle of the said plot, at the corner of Market Street and New Street, then north sixteen] degrees, west five chains seventeen links, more or less, to King Street ; then along King Street south seventy-four degrees west nine chains fifty-one links, more or less, to Church Street ; then south sixteen degrees east six chains thirty-four links, more or les.=, to Market Street ; then along Market Street north seventy- four degrees east two chains ; then north sixty-four degrees, east along Market Street seven chains sixty links, more or less, to the place of beginning, for the purpose of exposing for sale cattle, sheep, poultry, and other provisions, goods and merchandize, as aforesaid. Given under my hand and seal at arms, at York, this § I.] (Palace Street to the Market (Place. 41 twenty-sixth day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and three, and in the forty-fourth year of His Ma- jesty's reign. P. Hunter, Esquire, Lieutenant-Governor. By His Excellency's command, Wm. Jarvis, Secretary." In 1824, the Market Square was, by the direction of the County magistrates, closed in on the east, west, and south sides, " with a picketting and oak ribbon, the pickets at ten feet distance from each other, with three openings or foot-paths on each side." The digging of a public well here, in the direction of King Street, was an event of considerable interest in the town. Groups of school-boys every day scanned narrowly the progress of the undertaking ; a cap of one or the other of them, mischievously pre- cipitated to the depths where the labourers' mattocks were to be heard pecking at the shale below, may have impressed the execu- tion of this public work all the more indelibly on the recollection of some of them. By referring to a volume of the Upper Canada Gazette, we find that this was in 1823. An unofficial advertisement in that periodical, dated June the 9th, 1823, calls for proposals to be sent in to the office of the Clerk of the Peace, " for the sinking a well, stoning and sinking a pump therein, in the most approved manner, at the Market Square of the said town (of York), for the convenience of the Pubhc." It is added that persons desirous of contracting for the same, must give in their proposals on or before Tuesday, the first day of July next ensuing ; and the signature, " by the order of the Court," is that of " S. Heward, Clerk of the Peace, H. D." (Home District). The tender of John Hutchison and George Hetherington was accepted. They offered to do the work " for the sum of ^25 currency on coming to the rock, with the addition of seven shil- lings and sixpence per foot for boring into the rock until a suffi- cient supply of water can be got, should it be required." The work was done and the account paid July 30th, 1823. The charge for boring eight feet two inches through the rock was £2, u. id. The whole well and pump thus cost the County the modest sum of only ;^2 8 i.f. id. The charge for flagging round the pump, for "logs, stone and workmanship," was £'^ 2s. 4^d., paid to Mr> Hugh Carfrae, pathmaster. Near the pubHc pump, auctions in the open air occasionally took place. A humourous chapman in that line, Mr. Patrick Handy, used often here to be seen and heard, disposing of his miscella- 42 Toronto of Old. [§ i. neous wares. With Mr. Handy was associated for a time, in this business, Mr. Patrick McGann. And here we once witnessed the horrid exhibition of a public whipping, in the case of two culprits whose offence is forgotten. A dischaiged regimental drummer, a native African, administered the lash. The sheriff stood by, keep- ing count of the stripes. The senior of the two unfortunates bore his punishment with stoicism, encouraging the negro to strike with more force. The other, a young man, endeavoured for a little while to imitate his companion in this respect; but soon was obliged to evince by fearful cries the torture endured. Similar scenes were elsewhere to be witnessed in Canada. In the Montreal Herald ol September i6th, 1815, we have the following item of city news, given without comment : " Yesterday, between the hours of 9 and 10, pursuant to their sentences, Andr6 Latulippe, Henry Leopard, and John Quin, received 39 lashes each, in the New Market Place." The practice of whipping and even branding of •culprits in public had begun at York in 1798. In the Gazette and Oracle of Dec. ist, 1 798, printed at York, we have the note : " Last Monday William Hawkins was publicly whipped, and Joseph Mc- ■Carthy burned in the hand, at the Market Place, pursuant to their sentence." The crimes are not named. In the Market Square at York, the pillory and the stocks were also from time to time set up. The latter were seen in use for the last time in 1834. In 1804, a certain Elizabeth Ellis was, for " being a nuisance," sentenced by Chief Justice Allcock to be im- prisoned for six months, and "to stand in the pillory twice during the said imprisonment, on two different market days, opposite the Market House in the town of York, for the space of two hours ■each time." In the same year, the same sentence was passed on one Campbell, for using " seditious words." In 1 83 1 the wooden shambles were removed, and replaced in 1833 by a collegiate-looking building of red brick, quadrangularin its arrangement, with arched gateway entrances on King Street and Front Street. This edifice filled the whole square, with the ex- ception of roadways on the east and west sides. The public well was now concealed from view. It doubtless exists still, to be dis- covered and gloated over by the antiquarian of another century. Round the four sides of the new brick Market ran a wooden gallery, which served to shade the Butchers' stalls below. It was here that a fearful casualty occurred in 1834. A concourse of § I.J Palace Street to the Market (Place. 43 people were being addressed after the adjournment of a meeting on an electional question, when a portion of the overcrowded gal- lery fell, and several persons were caught on the sharp iron hooks of the stalls underneath, and so received fatal injuries. The killed and wounded on this memorable occasion were : — Son of Col. Fitz Gibbon, killed ; Mr. Hutton, killed ; Col. Fitz Gibbon, in- jured severely; Mr. Mountjoy, thigh broken; Mr. Cochrane, injured severely ; Mr. Charles Daly, thigh broken ; Mr. George Gumett, wound in the head ; Mr. Keating, injured internally ; Mr. Fenton, injured ; Master Gooderham, thigh broken ; Dr. Lithgow, contused severely; Mr. Morrison, contused severely; Mr. Alderman Denison, cut on the head ; Mr. Thornhill, thigh broken ; Mr. Street, arm broken ; Mr. Deese, thigh broken ; an- other Mr. Deese, leg and arm broken ; Mr. Sheppard, injmred in- ternally ; Mr. Clieve, Mr. Mingle, Mr. Preston, Mr. Armstrong, Mr. Leslie (of the Garrison), Master Billings, Mr. Duggan, Mr. Thomas Ridout, Mr. Brock, Mr. Turner, Mr. Hood (since dead), severely injured, &c. The damage done to the northern end of the quadrangle during the great fire of 1849 led to the demolition of the whole building, and the erection of the St. Lawrence Hall and Market. Over ■windows on the second storey at the south east corner of the red brick structure now removed, there appeared, for several years, two signs, united at the angle of the building, each indicating by its inscription the place of " The Huron and Ontario Railway" office. This was while the Northern Railway of Canada was yet exist- ing simply as a project. In connection with our notice of the Market, we give some col- lections which may serve to illustrate — EARLY PRICES AT YORK. During the war it was found expedient by the civil authorities to interfere, in some degree, with the law of supply and demand. The Magistrates, in Quarter Sessions assembled, agreed, in 1814, upon the following prices, as in their opinion fair and equitable to be paid by the military authorities for provisions :— Flour, per barrel, jQt, 10s. Wheat, per bushel, io.f. Pease, per bushel, 7^. 6d. Barley and Rye, the same. Oats, per bushel, '5^.. Hay, per ton, ^5. Straw, £7,. Beef, on foot, per cwt. £2 5^. ; slaughtered, 44 Toronto of Old. [§ i. per lb., 7}^(/. Pork, salted, per barrel, £,^ los. ; per carcass, T^d. Mutton, per lb., 9^. Veal, ?,d. Butter, is. ^d. Bread, per loaf of 4 lbs., IS. bd. In April, 1822, peace then reigning, York prices were : — Beef, per lb., 2d. a 4^. Mutton, Sid. a i,d. Veal, i^d. a ;;^(/. Potatoes, per bushel,. i.f. T,d. Turnips, is. Cabbages, per head, 2d. Flour, per cwt., 6s. 2,d. Flour, per barrel, 12s. dd. Tallow, per lb, 5^. Lard, per lb., 5^. Hay, per ton, £,2 10s. Pork, per barrel, ^2 los. Wood, per cord, 10s. As allied to the subject of early prices at York, we add some excerpts from the day-book of Mr. Abner Miles, conductor of the chief hotel of the place, in 1798. It would appear that the resi- dent gentry and others occasionally gave and partook of little din- ners at Mr. Miles', for which the charges are roughly minuted on some long, narrow pages of folded foolscap now lying before us. It will be seen from the record that the local " table-traits," as Dr. Doran would speak, were, as nearly as practicable those of the rest of the Empire at the period. At the new capital, however, in 1798, hosts and guests must have laboured under serious difficulties. In July, 1798, the following items appear against the names, conjointly of Messrs. Baby, Hamilton, and Commodore Grant : — Twenty-two dinners at Eight shillings, ;2^8 i6s. Sixteen to Coffee, ^1 I2S. Eight Suppers, i6s. Twenty-three quarts and and one pintof wine, ;^io iis. 6d. Eight bottles of porter, ;^2 8s. Two- bottles of syrup-punch, j[^\ 4s. One bottle of brandy and one bottle of rum, 1 8s. Altogether amounting to ;^2 6 5s. 6d. (The currency throughout Mr. Miles' books is that of New York, in which the shilling was seven pence half-penny. The total just given denoted between ;£\(i and ;^i7 of modern Canadian money. It is observable that in the entries of which we give specimens, whiskey, the deadly bane of later years, in not named.) On the 17th June, Thomas Ridout, Jonathan Scott, Col. Fortune, Surveyor Jones, Samuel Heron, Mr. Jarvis [the Secretary], Adjutant McGill, and Mr. Crawford are each charged i6s. as his quota of a "St. John's dinner." On the 4th of June, an entry against " the Chief Justice" [Elmsley], runs thus : Eighteen dinners at Eight shillings, ;^7 4s- § I.] (Palace Street to the Market 'Place. 45 Three bottles Madeira, ;£i 7s. One bottle brandy, los. Five bottles of port wine, four bottles of porter and one pint of rum are charged, but the value is not given. The defect is supplied in a later entry against the Chief Justice, of seven dinners (42s.) ; where two pints of port wine are charged 9s. ; one pint of brandy, 5s. ; two bottles port wine, i8s. ; one bottle white wine, 9s. ; one bottle of porter, 6s. On this occasion " four took coffee," at a cost ot 8s. Elsewhere, three dinners are charged to the Chief Justice, when three bottles of wine were required ; one pint of brandy, and two bottles of porter, all at the rates already quoted. A " mess dinner" is mentioned, for which the Chief Justice, Mr. Hallowell, and Mr. Cartwright pay 6s. each. One bottle of port, one of Madeira, and one of brandy were ordered, and the "three took coffee," as before at 2s. a head. Again, at a " mess dinner," of four, the names not given, two bottles of port and one bottle of porter were taken. A " club" appears to have met here. In July, 1798, a charge against the names of " Esq. Weekes," " Esq. Rogers," and Col. Fortune, respectively, is "liquor in club the nth at dinner, is. 6d." On July 6th " Judge Powell" is charged for supper, 2s. ; for one quart of wine, 9s. On the same day " Judge Powell's servant" had a "gill brandy, is. 3d. and' one glass do., 8d." A few days after- wards, a reverend wayfarer calls at the inn ; baits his beast, and modestly refreshes himself The entry runs : — " Priest from River La Tranche, 3 quarts corn and half-pint of wine. Breakfast, 2s 6d." On another day, Capt. Herrick has a " gill gin sling, is. 3d. ; also immediately afterwards a " half-pint of gin sling, 3s." At the same time Capt. Demont has "gill rum sling, is. 3d.," and "gill rum, IS." Capt. Fortune has " half-pint wine, 2s.," and "Esq. Weekes," "gill brandy, IS 3d." Col. Fortune has " gill sour punch, 2s." This sour punch is approved of by " Dunlap"— who at one place four times in immediate succession, and frequently elsewhere, is charged with " glass sour punch, 2S." Jacob Cozens takes " one bottle Ma- deira wine, los. ;" Samuel Cozens, " one bottle Madeira wine, los., and bread and cheese, is. ;" and Shivers Cozens, " bottle of wine, IDS., and bread and cheese, is. Conets Cozens has "dinner, 2s., a gill of brandy, is., and halfa bushel of seed corn, 7s." On the 5th of July, Josiah Phelps has placed opposite his name, " one glass punch, 3s. ; three bowls sour punch, 9s. ; gill rum, is. ; two gin slings, 2s. 6d. ; bowl punch, 3s. ; gill rum, is. ; two gills syrup punch, 4s. ; supper, 2s." About the same time Corporal Wilson 46 Toronto of Old. [§ i. had "two mugs beer, 4s." On the 6th of July Commodore Grant had " half-pint rum, for medson, 2s. ; and immediately after another half-pint rum, for do., 2 s.'' One " Billy Whitney" figures often; his purchases one day were : "gill rum sling, is. 6d. ; do., is. 6d. ; half-pound butter, is. 3d." Capt. Hall takes " one gill punch, 2s. ; glass rum, 6d., and half-gallon punch, 7s." He at the same time has two dollars in cash advanced to him by the obliging landlord, i6s. Mr. Abner Miles supplied customers with general provisions as well as liquors. On one occasion he sells, " White, Attorney-Gene- ral," three pounds of butter for 7s. 6d., and six eggs for is. 6d. He also sells " President Russell" forty-nine pounds and three- fourths, of beef at is. per pound; Mr. Attorney-General White took twenty-three pounds and a half at the same price. That sold to " Robert Gray, Esq.," is described as " a choice piece," and is charged two pence extra per pound. The piece, however, weighed only seven pounds, and the cost was just Eight shillings and two pence. Other things are supplied by Mr. Miles. Gideon Badger buys of him " one yard red spotted cassimere, 20s. ; one and a-half dozen buttons, 3s ; and a pair shears, 3s." At the same time Mr. Badger is credited with " one dollar, 8s." Joseph Kendrick gets " sole leather for pair of shoes for self, by old Mr. Ketchum, 6s." Mr. Miles moreover furnishes Mr. Allan with "237 feet of inch-and- half plank at 1 2s., 33s. ; two rod of garden fence at los.j 20s." We suppose the moneys received were recorded elsewhere generally ; but on the pages before us we have such entries as the following : " Messrs. Hamilton, Baby and Grant settled up to 4th of July, after breakfast." " Dr. Gamble, at Garrison," obtained ten bushels of oats and is to pay therefor ^4. A mem. is entered of "Angus McDonell, dr.. Dinner sent to his tent." and " Capt. Demont, cr. By note of hand for;^26 5s. Halifax currency, ;^42 York." On the same day the Captain indulges in "a five dollar cap, 40s.," and "one gill rum, IS." That some of Mr. Miles' customers required to be re- minded of their indebtedness to him, we learn from an advertisement in the Gazette and Oracle ol kxLgv&X. ■x,\, 1799. It says : " The Sub- scriber informs all those indebted to him by note or book, to make payment by the 20th September next, or he will be under the dis- agreeable necessity of putting them into the hands of an attorney. Abner Miles, York, August 28th, 1799." Mr. Miles' house was a rendezvous for various purposes. In a Gazette and Oracle of § I.J (Palace Street to the Market (Place. 47 Dec. 8, 1798) we read— "The gentlemen of the Town and Garri- son are requested to meet at one o'clock, on Monday next, the loth instant, at Miles' Hotel, in order to arrange the place of the York Assemblies for the season. York, Dec. 8, 1798." In another number of the same paper an auction is advertised to take place at Miles' Tavern. In the Gazette and Oracle oi ]\i\y 13th, 1799, we read the follow- ing advertisement : " O. Pierce and Co. have for sale : Best spirits by the puncheon, barrel, or ten gallons, 20s. per gal. Do. by the single gallon, 22s. Rum by the puncheon, barrel, or ten gallons, ] 8s. per gal. Brandy by the barrel, 20s. per gal. Port wine by the barrel, i8s. per gal. Do. by single gallon, 20s. per gal. Gin, by the barrel, i8s. per gal. Teas — Hyson, 19s. per lb.; Souchong, 14s. do. ; Bohea, 8s. do. Sugar, best loaf, 3s. 9d. per lb. Lump, 3s. 6d. Raisins, 3s. Figs, 3s. Salt six dollars per barrel or 12s. per bushel. Also, a few dry goods, shoes, leather, hats, tobacco, snuff, &C., &c. York, July 6, 1799. These prices appear to be in Halifax currency. II. FRONT STREET, FROM THE MARKET PLACE TO BROCK STREET. HE comer we approach after passing the Market ^^ Square, was occupied by an inn with a sign-board sustained on a high post inserted at the outer edge of the foot-path, in country roadside fashion. This "was Hamilton's, or the White Svan. It was here, we beUeve, or in an adjoining house, that a traveUing citizen ^ of the United States, in possession of a collection of stuffed birds and similar objects, endeavoured at an early period to establish a kind of Natural History Museum. To the collec- tion here was once rashly added figures, in wax, of General Jackson and some other United States notabilities, all in grand costume. Several of these were one night abstracted from the Museum by some over-patriotic youths, and suspended by the neck from the limbs of one of the large trees that over-looked the harbour. Just beyond was the Steamboat Hotel, long known as Ulick Howard's, remarkable for the spirited delineation of a steam-packet of vast dimensions, extending the whole length of the building, just over the upper verandah of the hotel. In 1828, Mr. Howard is offering to let his hotel, in the following terms: — "Steamboat Hotel, York, U. C. — The proprietor of this elegant establishment, now unrivalled in this part of the country, being desirous of retir- ing from Public Business, on account of ill-health in his family, will let the same for a term of years to be agreed op, either with or without the furniture. The Establishment is now too well- known to require comment. N. B. Security will be required for the payment f f the Rent, and the fulfilment of the contract in every respect. Apply to the subscriber on the premises. U. Howard, York, Oct. 8th, 1828." § 2.] From the Market (Place to (Brock Street. 49 A little further on was the Ontario House, a hotel built in a style common then at the Falls of Niagara and in the United States. A row of lofty piUars, well-grown pines in fact, stripped and smoothly planed, reached from the ground to the eaves, and sup- ported two tiers of galleries, which, running behind the columns, did not interrupt their vertical lines. Close by the Ontario House, Market Street from the west entered Front Street at an acute angle. In the gore between the two streets, a building sprang up, which, in conforming to its site, assumed the shape of a coffin. The foot of this ominous structure was the office where travellers booked themselves for various parts in the stages that from time to time started from York. It took four days to reach Niagara in 1816. We are informed by a con- temporary advertisement now before us, that "on the 20th of Sep- tember next [18 1 6], a stage will commence running between York and Niagara : it will leave York every Monday, and arrive at Nia- gara on Thursday ; and leave Queenston every Friday. The bag- gage is to be considered at the risk of the owner, and the fare to be paid in advance." In 1824, the mails were conveyed the same distance, via Ancaster, in three days. In a post-office advertise- ment for tenders, signed " William Allan, P. M.," we have the statement : " The mails are made up here [York] on the afternoon of Monday and Thursday, and must be delivered at Niagara on the Wednesday and Saturday following ; and within the same period in returning." In 1835, Mr. William Weller was the proprietor of a line of stages between Toronto and Hamilton, known as the " Telegraph Line." In an advertisement before us, he engages to take passengers " through by daylight, on the Lake Road, during the winter season." Communication with England was at this period a tedious pro- cess. So late as 1836, Mrs. Jameson thus writes in her Journal at Toronto (i. 182) : " It is now seven weeks since the date of the last letters from my dear far-distant home. The Archdeacon," she adds " told me, by way of comfort, that when he came to settle in this country, there was only one mail-post from England in the course of a whole year, and it was caUed, as if in mockery, the Express." To this " Express" we have a reference in a post-office advertisement to be seen in a Quebec Gazette of 1792 = "A mail for the Upper Countries, comprehending Niagara and Detroit, will be closed," it says, " at this office, on Monday, the 30th inst., D 50 Toronto of Old. ■ [§ 2, at 4 o'clock in the evening, to be forwarded from Montreal by the annual winter Express, on Thursday, the 3rd of Feb. next." From the same paper we learn that on the roth of November, the latest date from Philadelphia and New York was Oct. 8th : also, that a weekly conveyance had lately been established between Montreal and Burlington, Vermont. In the Gazette of Jan. 13, 1808, we have the following: " For the information of the Public— York, 12th Jan., 1808. — -The first mail from Lower Canada is arrived, and letters are ready to be delivered by W. Allan, Acting-Deputy- Postmaster." Compare all this with advertisements in Toronto daily papers now, from agencies in the town, of " Through Lines" weekly, to California, Vancouver's, China and Japan, connecting with Lines to Australia and New Zealand. On the beach below the Steamboat Hotel was, at a late period, a market for the sale of fish. It was from this spot that Bartlett, in his " Canadian Scenery," made one of the sketches intended to convey to the English eye an impression of the town. In the fore- ground are groups of conventional, and altogether too picturesque, fishwives and squaws : in the distance is the junction of Hospital Street and Front Street, with the tapering building between. On the right are the galleries of what had been the Steamboat Hotel ; it here bears another name. Bartletf s second sketch is from the end of a long wharf or jetty to the west. The large building in firont, with a covered passage through it for vehicles, is the warehouse or freight depot of Mr. William Cooper, long the owner of this favourite landing place. Westwards, the pUlared front of the Ontario house is to be seen. Both of these views already look quaint, and possess a value as preserving a shadow of much that no longer exists. Where Mr. Cooper's Wharf joined the shore there was a ship- building yard. We have a recollection of a launch that strangely took place here on a Sunday. An attempt to get the ship into the water on the preceding day had failed. Delay would have occa- sioned an awkward settling of the ponderous mass. We shall have occasion hereafter to speak of the early shipping of the harbour. The lot extending northward from the Ontario House corner to King street was the property of Attorney-General Macdonell, who, while in attendance on General Brock as Provincial aide-de-camp, was slain in the engagement on Queenston Heights. His death I-' m i'.-^ § 2.] From the Market (Place to (Brock Street. 5 1 careated the vacancy to which, at an unusually early age, succeeded Mr. John Beverley Robinson, afterwards the distinguished Chief Justice of Upper Canada. Mr. Macdonell's remains are, deposited with those of his miUtary chief under the column on Queenston Heights. He bequeathed the property to which our attention has been directed, to a youthful nephew, Mr. James Macdonell, on certain conditions, one of which was that he should be educated in the tenets of the AngHcan Church, notwithstanding the Roman Catholic persuasion of the rest of the family. The track for wheels that here descended to the water's edge from the north. Church Street subsequently, was long considered a road remote from the business part of the town, like the road leading southward from Charing-cross, as shewn in Ralph Aggas' early map of London. A row of frame buildings on its eastern side, in the direction of King Street, perched high on cedar posts over excavations generally filled with water, remained in an un- finished state until the whole began to be out of the perpendicular and to become gray with the action of the weather. It was evi- dently a premature undertaking ; the folly of an over-sanguine spe- culator. Yonge street beyond, where it approached the shore of the harbour, was unfrequented. In spring and autumn it was a notorious slough. In 1830, a small sum would have purchased any of the building lots on either side of Yonge Street, between Front Street and Market Street. Between Church Street and Yonge Street, now, we pass a short street uniting Front Street with Wellington Street. Like SaHsbury, Cecil, Craven and other short but famous streets off the Strand, it retains the name of the distinguished person whose property it tra- versed in the first instance. It is called Scott Street, from Chief Justice Thomas Scott, whose residence and grounds were here. Mr. Scott was one of the venerable group of early personages of whom we shall have occasion to speak. He was a man of fine culture, and is spoken of affectionately by those who knew him. His stature was below the average. A heavy, overhanging fore- head intensified the thoughtful expression of his countenance, which belonged to the class suggested by the current portraits of the United States jurist, Kent. We sometimes, to this day, fall in with books from his library, bearing his familiar auto- graph. Mr. Scott was the first chairman and president of the " Loyal 52 Toronto of Old. [§ 2. and Patriotic Society of Upper Canada," organized at York in 1812. His name consequently appears often in the Report of that Association, printed by William Gray in Montreal in 18 17. The objects of the Society were "to aiford relief and aid to disa- bled militiamen and their families : to reward merit, excite emula- tion, and commemorate glorious exploits, by bestowing medals and other honorary marks of public approbation and distinction for extraordinary instances of personal courage and fidelity in defence of the Province." The preface to the Report mentions that " the sister-colony of Nova Scotia, excited by the barbarous conflagration of the town of Newark and the devastation on that frontier, had, by a legislative act, contributed largely to the relief of this Province." In an appeal to the British public, signed by Chief Justice Scott, it is stated that "the subscription of the town of York amounted in a few days to eight hundred and seventy-five pounds five shil- lings. Provincial currency, dollars at five shillings each, to be paid annually during the war ; and that at Kingston to upwards of four hundred pounds." Medals were struck in London by order of the Loyal and Pat- riotic Society of Upper Canada ; but they were never distributed. The diificulty of deciding who were to receive them was found to be too great. They were defaced and broken up in York, with such rigour that not a solitary specimen is known to exist. Rum- ours of one lurking somewhere, continue to this day, to tantalize local numismatists. What became of the bullion of which they were composed used to be one of the favourite vexed questions among the old people of York. Its value doubtless was added to the surplus that remained of the funds of the Society, which, after the year 181 7, were devoted to benevolent objects. To the building fund of the York General Hospital, we believe, a consi- derable donation was made. The medal, we are told, was two and one-half inches in diameter. On the obverse, within a wreath of laurel, were the words "for merit." On this side was also the legend : "presented by a grateful country. On the reverse was the following elaborate device : A strait between two lakes : on the North side a beaver (emblem of peaceful industry), the ancient cognizance of Canada : in the background an English Lion slumbering. On the South side of the Strait, the American eagle planing in the air, as if checked from seizing the Beaver by the § 2.] From the Market (Place to (Brock Street. 53 presence of the Lion. Legend on this side : " upper Canada PRESERVED.'' Scott Street conducts to the site, on the north side of Hospital Street, westward of the home of Mr. James Baby, and, eastward, to that of Mr. Peter Macdougall, two notable citizens of York. A notice of Mr. Baby occurs in Sibbald's Canadian Magazine for March, 1833. The following is an extract : " James Baby was bom at Detroit in 1762. His family was one of the most ancient in the colony ; and it was noble. His father had removed from Lower Canada to the neighbourhood of Detroit before the con- quest of Quebec, where, in addition to the cultivation of lands, he was connected with the fur-trade, at that time, and for many years after, the great staple of the country. James was educated at the Roman Catholic Seminary of Quebec, and returned to the paternal roof soon after the peace of 1783. The family had ever been dis- tinguished (and indeed all the higher French families) for their ad- herence to the British crown ; and to this, more than to any other cause, are we to attribute the conduct of the Province of Quebec during the American War. Being a great favourite with his father, James was permitted to make an excursion to Europe, before en- gaging steadily In business ; and after spending some time, espe- cially in England, rejoined his family. * * * There was a primitive simplicity in Mr. Baby's character, which, added to his polished manners and benignity of disposition, threw a moral beauty around him which is very seldom beheld." In the history of the Indian chief Pontiac, who, in 1763, aimed at extirpating the English, the name of Mr. Baby's father repeat- edly occurs. The Canadian habitans of the neighbourhood of Detroit, being of French origin, were xmmolested by the Indians ; but a rumour had reached the great Ottawa chief, while the memo- rable siege of Detroit was in progress, that the Canadians had accepted a bribe from the English to induce them to attack the Indians. " Pontiac," we read in Parkman's History, p. 227, " had been an old friend of Baby ; and one evening, at an early period of the siege, he entered his house, and, seating himself by the fire, looked for some time steadily at the embers. At length, raising his head, he said he had heard that the English had offered the Canadian a bushel of silver for the scalp of his friend. Baby de- clared that the story was false, and protested that he never would betray him. Pontiac for a moment keenly studied his features. 54 Toronto of Old. [§ 2. ' My brother has spoken the truth,' he said, ' and I will show that 1 believe him.' He remained in the house through the evening, and, at its close, wrapped himself in his blanket and lay down upon a bench, where he slept in full confidence till morning." Note that the name Baby is to be pronounced Baw-bee. Mr. Macdougall was a gentleman of Scottish descent, but, like his compatriots in the neighbourhood of Murray Bay, so thoroughly Lower-Canadianized as to be imperfectly acquainted with the English language to the last. He was a successful merchant of the town of York, and filled a place in the old local conversational talk, in which he was sometimes spoken of as " Wholesale, Retail, Pete McDoug," — an expression adopted by himself on some occa- sion. He is said once to have been much perplexed by the item " ditto'' occurring in a bill of lading furnished of goods under way ; he could not remember having given orders for any such article. He was a shrewd business man. An impression prevailed in cer- tain quarters that his profits were now and then extravagant. While he was living at Niagara, some burglars from Youngstown broke into his warehouse ; and after helping themselves to what- ever they pleased, they left a written memorandum accounting for their not having taken with them certain other articles : it was " because they were marked too high." That he was accustomed to affix a somewhat arbitrary value to his merchandise, seems to be shown by another story that was told of him. He was said, one day, when trade in general was very dull, to have boasted that he had that very morning made .;^400 by a single operation. On being questioned, it appeared that it had been simply a sudden enlargement of the figure marked on all his stock to the extent of .;^4oo. One other story of him is this: On hearing a brother dealer lament that by a certain speculation he should, after all, make only 5 per cent., he expressed his surprise, adding that he himself would be satisfied with 3, or even 2, (taking the figures 2, 3, &c., to mean 2 hundred, 3 hundred, &c.) — We shall hear of Mr. Macdougall again in connection with the marine of the harbour. Of Yonge Steeet itself, at which we now arrive, we propose to speak at large hereafter. Just westward from Yonge Street was the abode, surrounded by pleasant grounds and trees, of Mr. Macaulay, at a later period Sir James Macaulay, Chief Justice o^ the Common Pleas, a man beloved and honoured for his sterling § 2.] From the Market (Place to (Brock Street. 55 excellence in every relation. A full-length portrait of him is pre- served in Osgoode Hall. His peculiar profile, not discernable in that painting, is recalled by the engraving of Capt. Starky, which some readers will remember in Hone's Every-Day Book. Advancing a little further, we came in front of of one of the earliest examples, in these parts, of an English-looking rustic cot- tage, with verandah and sloping lawn. This was occupied for a time by Major Hillier, of the 74th regiment, aide-de-camp and mili- tary secretary to Sir Peregrine Maitland. The well-developed native thorn-tree, to the north of the site of this cottage, on the property of Mr. Andrew Mercer, is a relic of the woods that once ornamented this locality. Next came the residence of Mr. Justice Boulton, a spacious family domicile of wood, painted white, situated in an extensive area, and placed far back from the road. The Judge was an Eng- lish gentleman of spare Wellington physique ; like many of his de- scendants, a lover of horses and a spirited rider ; a man of wit, too, and humour, fond of listening to and narrating anecdotes of the ben trovato class. The successor to this family home was Holland House, a structure of a baronial cast, round which one might ex- pect to find the remains of a moat ; a reproduction, in some points, as in name, of the building in the suburbs of London, in which was bom the Judge's immediate heir, Mr. H. J. Boulton, succes- sively Solicitor-General for Upper Canada, and Chief Justice of Newfoundland. When Holland House passed out of the hands of its original possessor, it became the property of Mr. Alexander Manning, an Alderman of Toronto. It was at Holland House that the Earl and Countess of Dufiferin kept high festival during a brief sojourn in the capital of Ontano, in 1872. Suggested by public addresses received in infinite variety, within Holland House was written or thought out that remarkable cycle of rescripts and replies which rendered the vice-regal visit to Toronto so memorable,— a cycle of rescripts and replies exceed- ingly wide in its scope, but in which each requisite topic was touched with consummate skill, and in such a way as to show in each direction genuine human sympathy and heartiness of feeling, and a sincere desire to cheer and strengthen the endeavour after the Good, the Beautiful and the True, in every quarter. Whilst making his visit to Quebec, before coming to Toronto, 56 Toronto of Old. [§ 2. Lord DufFerin, acting doubtless on a chivalrous and poetical im- pulse, took up his abode in the Citadel, notwithstanding the absence of worthy arrangements for his accommodation there. Will not this bold and original step on the part of Lord DufFerin lead hereafter to the conversion of the Fortress that crowns Cape Diamond into a Rheinstein for the St. Lawrence — into an appro- priately designed castellated habitation, to be reserved as an occa- sional retreat, nobly-seated and grandly historic, for the Viceroys of Canada ? We now passed the grounds and house of Chief-Justice Powell. In this place we shall only record our recollection of the profound sensation created far and wide by the loss of the Chief-Justice's daughter in the packet ship Albion, wrecked oif the Head of Kin- sale, on the 22nd of April, 1822. A voyage to the mother country at that period was still a serious undertaking. We copy a contem- poraneous extract from the Cork Southern Reporter : — " The Albion, whose loss at Garrettstown Bay we first mentioned in our paper of Tuesday, was one of the finest class of ships between Liverpool and New York, and was 500 tons burden. We have since learned some further particulars, by which it appears that her loss was at- tended with circumstances of a peculiarly afflicting nature. She had lived out the tremendous gale of the entire day on Sunday,, and Captain Williams consoled the passengers, at eight o'clock in the evening, with the hope of being able to reach Liverpool on the day but one after, which- cheering expectation induced almost all of the passengers, particularly the females, to retire to rest. In some short time, however, a violent squall came on, which in a moment carried away the masts, and, there being no possibility of disengaging them from the rigging, encumbered the hull so that she became unmanageable, and drifted at the mercy of the waves, till the light-house of the Old Head was discovered, the wreck still nearing in ; when the Captain told the sad news to the passengers, that there was no longer any hope ; and, soon after she struck. From thenceforward all was distress and confusion. The vessel soon went to pieces, and, of the crew and passengers, only six of the former and nine of the latter were saved." The names of the passengers are added, as follows : " Mr. Benyon, a London gentleman ; Mr. N. Ross, of Troy, near New York ; Mr. Conyers, and his brother-in- law. Major Gough, 68th regiment ; Mr. and Mrs. Clarke, Ameri- cans ; Madame Gardinier and son, a boy about eight years of age ;, § 2.] From the Market (Place to (Brock Street. 57 Col. Prevost ; Mr. Dwight, of Boston ; Mrs. Mary Pye, of New York ; Miss Powell, daughter of the Honourable William Dummer Powell, Chief-Justice of Upper Canada ; Rev. Mr. Hill, Jamaica, coming homeby the way of the United States ; Professor Fisher, of New. Haven, Connecticut ; Mr. Gurnee, New York ; Mr. Proctor, New York ; Mr. Dupont, and five other Frenchmen ; Mrs. Mary Brewster ; Mr. Hirst, Mr. Morrison, and Stephen Chase." The Weekly Register oi York, of June 13, 1822, the number that contains the announcement of the wreck of the Albion packet, has also the following paragraph : " Our Attorney-General arrived in London about the 22nd of March, and up to the nth of April had daily interviews of great length with ministers. It gives us real pleasure to announce," — so continues the editorial of the Weekly Register — " that his mission is likely to be attended with the most complete success, and that our relations with the Lower Provinces will be put on a firm and advantageous footing. We have no doubt that Mr. Robinson will deserve the general thanks of the country." A family party from York had embarked m the packet of the preceding month, and were, as this paragraph intimates, safe in London on the 22nd of March. The disastrous fate of the lady above named was thus rendered the more distressing to friends and relatives, as she was present in New York when that packet sailed, but for some obscure reason, she did not desire to embark therein along with her more fortunate fellow townsfolk. After the house and grounds of Chief-Justice Powell came the property of Dr. Strachan, of whom much hereafter. In view of the probable future requirements of his position in a growing town and . growing country. Dr. Strachan built, in 1818, a residence here of capacious dimensions and good design, with extensive and very complete appurtenances. A brother of the Doctor's, Mr. James Strachan, an intelligent bookseller of Aberdeen, visited York in 181 9, soon after the first occupation of the new house by its owners. The two brothers, John and James, had not seen each other since 1799, when John, a young man just twenty-one, was setting out for Canada, to undertake a tutorship in a family at Kingston ; set- ting out with scant money outfit, but provided with what was of more value, a sound constitution, a clear head, and a good strong understanding trained in Scottish schools and colleges, and by familiar intercourse with shrewd Scottish folk. As James entered the gates leading into the new mansion, and 58 Toronto of Old. [§ i. cast a comprehensive glance at the fine fagade of the building before him and over its pleasant and handsome surroundings, he suddenly paused ; and indulging in a stroke of sly humour, ad- dressed his brother with the words, spoken in grave confidential undertone, — " I hope it's a' come by honestly, John !" On his return to Scotland, Mr. James Strachan published " A Visit to the Province of Upper Canada in 1819," an interesting book, now scarce and desired by Canadian collectors. The bulk of the information contained in this volume was confessedly derived from Dr. Strachan. The bricks used in the construction of the house here in 181 8 were manufactured on the spot. One or two earlier brick buildings at York were composed of materials brought from Kingston or Montreal ; recalling the parallel fact that the first bricks used for building in New York were imported from Holland ; just as in the present day, (though now, of course, for a different reason,) houses are occasionally constructed at Quebec with white brick manufac- tured in England. We next arrived at a large open space, much broken up by a rivulet — " Russell's Creek," — that meandered most recklessly through it. This piece of ground was long known as Simcoe Place, and was set apart in the later plan for the extension of York westward, as a Public Square. Overlooking this area from the north-west, at the present day, is one of the elms of the origi- nal forest — an unnoticeable sapling at the period referred to, but now a tree of stately dimensions and of very gracefiil form, resem- bling that of the Greek letter Psi. It will be a matter of regret when the necessities of the case shall render the removal of this relic indispensible. At the comer to the south of this conspicuous tree, was an inn long known as the Greenland Fishery. Its sign bore on one side, quite passably done, an Arctic or Greenland scene ; and on the other, vessels and boats engaged in the capture of the whale. A travelling sailor, familiar with whalers, and additionally a man of some artistic taste and skill, paid his reckoning in labour, by exe- cuting for the landlord, Mr. Wright, these spirited paintings, which proved an attraction to the house. John Street, which passes north, by the Greenland Fishery, bears one of the Christian names of the first Governor of Upper Canada. Graves Street, on the east side of the adjoining Square, bore his § 2.] From the Market (Place to (Brock Street. 59 second Christian name ; but Graves Street has, in recent times, been transformed into Simcoe Street. When the Houses of Parliament, now to be seen stretching across Simcoe Place, were first built, a part of the design was a central pediment supported by four stone columns. This would have relieved and given dignity to the long front, The stone platform beiore the principal entrance was constructed with a flight of steps leading thereto ; but the rather graceful portico which it was in- tended to sustain, was never added. The monoliths for the pillars were duly cut out at a quarry near Hamilton. They long remained lying there, in an unfinished state. In the lithographic view of the Parliament Buildings, published by J. Young, their architect, in 1836, the pediment of the original design is given as though it ex- isted. Along the edge of the water, below the properties, spaces and objects which we have been engaged in noticing, once ran a shingly beach of a width sufficient to admit of the passage of vehicles. A succession of dry seasons must then have kept the waters low. In 1815, however, the waters of the Lake appear to have been unu- sually high. An almanac of that year, published by John Cameron, at York, offers, seriously as it would seem, the subjoined explana- tion of the phenomenon : " The comet which passed to the north- ward three years since," the writer suggests, " has sensibly affected our seasons : they have become colder; the snows fall deeper; and from lesser exhalation, and other causes, the Lakes rise much higher than usual." The Commissariat store-houses were situated here, just beyond the broken ground of Simcoe Place ; long white structures of wood, with the shutters of the windows always closed ; built on a level with the bay, yet having an entrance in the rear by a narrow gangway from the cliff above, on which, close by, was the guard-house, a small building, painted of a dun colour, with a roof of one slope, incHning to the south, and an arched stoup or verandah open to the north. Here a sentry was ever to be seen, pacing up and down. A light bridge over a deep water-course led up to the guard-house. Over other depressions or ravines, close by here, were long to be seen some platforms or floored areas of stout plank. These were said to be spaces occupied by different portions of the renowned canvas-house of the first Governor, a structure manufac- 6o Toronto of Old. [§ 2. tured in London and imported. The convenience of its plan, and the hospitality for which it afforded room, were favourite topics among the early people of the country. We have it in Bouchette's Bt itish North America a reference to this famous canvas house. " In the spring {i. e. of 1793)," that writer says, "the Lieutenant-Governor moved to the site of the new capital (York), attended by the regi- ment of the Queen's Rangers, and commenced at once the realiza- tion of his favourite project. His Excellency inhabited, during the summer, and through the winter, a canvas-house, which he im- ported expressly for the occasion ; but, frail as was its substance, it was rendered exceedingly comfortable, and soon became as dis- tinguished for the social and urbane hospitality of its venerable and gracious host, as for the peculiarity of its structure," vol. i. 80. After this allusion to the home Canadian life of the first Governor, the following remarks of de Liancourt, on the same subject, will not appear out of place ; — " In his private life," the Duke says, " Gov. Simcoe is simple, plain and obliging. He inhabits [the reference now is to Newark or Niagara] a small, miserable wooden house, which formerly was occupied by the Commissaries, who resided here on account of the navigation of the Lake. His guard consist of four soldiers, who every morning come from the fort [across the river], and return thither in the evening. He lives in a noble and hospitable manner, without pride ; his mind is enlight- ened, his character mild and obliging; he discourses with much good sense on all subjects ; but his favourite topics are his projects, and war, which seem to be the objects of his leading passions. He is acquainted with the military history of all countries : no hillock catches his eye without exciting in his mind the idea of a fort which might be constructed on the spot ; and with the construc- tion of this fort he associates the plan of operations for a campaign, especially of that which is to lead him to Philadelphia. [Gen. Simcoe appears to have been stronglyof the opinion that the United States were not going to be a permanency.] On hearing his pro- fessions of an earnest desire of peace, you cannot but suppose, either that his reason must hold an absolute sway over his passion, or that he deceives himself" Travels, i. 241. Other traits, which doubtless at this time gave a charm to the home-life of the accomplished Governor, may be gathered from a passage in the correspondence, at a later period, of Polwhele, the historian of Cornwall, who says, in a letter addressed to the Gene- § 2.] From the Market Place to (Brock Street. 6i ral himself, dated Manaccan, Nov. 5th, 1803 :— " I have bern sorely disappointed, once or twice, in missing you, whilst you were inspecting Cornwall. It was not long after your visit at my friend Mr. Hoblyn's, but I slept also at Nanswhydden. Had I met you there, the Nodes AtticcB, the Cmnx Deorum, would have been re- newed, if peradventure the chess-board intervened not ; for rooks and pawns, I think, would have frightened away the Muses, familiar as rooks and pawns might have been to the suitors of Penelope.'' J'olwhele, 544. The canvas-house above spoken of, had been the property of Capt Cook the circumnavigator. On its being offered for sale in London, Gov. Simcoe, seeing its possible usefulness to himself as a moveable government-house purchased it. Some way to the east of the Commissariat store-houses was the site of the Naval Building Yard, where an unfinished ship-of-war and the materials collected for the construction of others, were destroyed, when the United States forces took possession of York in 1813. It appears that Col. Joseph Bouchettehad just been pointing out to the Government the exposed condition of the public property here. In a note at p. 89 of his British North America that officer remarks : " The defenceless situation of York, the mode of its cap- ture, and the destruction of the large ship then on the stocks, were but too prophetically demonstrated in my report to headquarters in Lower Canada, on my return from a responsible mission to the capital of the Upper Province, in the early part of April. Indeed the communication of the result of my reconnoitering operations, and the intelUgence of the successful invasion of York, and the firing of the new ship by the enemy, were received almost simul- taneously." The Govemor-in-Chief, Sir George Prevost, was blamed for having permitted a fiigate to be laid down in an unprotected position. There was a " striking impropriety," as the Third Letter of Veritas, a celebrated correspondent of the Montreal Herald in 1815, points out, " in building at York, without provid- ing the means of security there, as the works of defence, projected by General Brock, (when he contemplated, before the war, the re- moval of the naval depot firom Kingston to York, by reason of the proximity of the former to the States in water by the ice), were dis- continued by orders firom below, [firom Sir George Prevost, that is], 62 Toronto of Old. [§ 2. and never resumed. The position intended to have been fortified by General Brock, near York, was," Veritas continues, " capable of being made very strong, had his plan been executed ; but as it was not, nor any other plan of defence adopted, a ship-yard without protection became an allurement to the enemy, as was felt to the cost of the inhabitants of York.'' In the year 1832, the interior of the Commissariat-store, deco- rated with flags, was the scene of the first charitable bazaar held in these parts. It was for the relief of distress occasioned by a recent visitation of cholera. The enterprise appears to have been remark- ably successful. We have a notice of it in Sibbald's Canadian Magazine of January, 1833, in the following terms: "All the fashionable and well-disposed attended ; the band of the gallant 79th played, at each table stood a lady ; and in a very short time all the articles were sold to gentlemen, — who will keep ' as the apple of their eye' the things made and presented by such hands." The sum collected on the occasion, it is added, was three hundred and eleven pounds. Where Windsor Street now appears — with its grand iron gates at either end, inviting or forbidding the entrance of the stranger to the prim, quaint, self-contained little village of villas inside — formerly stood the abode of Mr. John Beikie, whose tall, upright, staidly-moving form, generally enveloped in a long snufif-coloured overcoat, was one of the dramatis personos of York. He had been, at an early period, sheriff of the Home District ; at a later time his signature was familiar to every eye, attached in the Gazette to notices put forth by the Executive Council of the day, of which rather aristocratic body he was the Clerk. Passing westward, we had on the right the spacious home of Mr. Crookshank, a benevolent and excellent man, sometime Receiver- General of the Province, of whom we shall again have occasion to speak ; and on the left, on a promontory suddenly jutting out into the harbour, •' Captain Bonnycastle's cottage," with garden and picturesque grove attached ; all Ordnance property in reality, and once occupied by Col. Coffin. The whole has now been literally eaten away by the ruthless tooth of the steam excavator. On the beach to the west of this promontory was a much frequented bath- ing-place. Captain Bonnycastle, just named, was afterwards Sir Richard, and the author of " Canada as it was, is, and may be " and " Canada and the Canadians in 1846." § 2.] From the Market (tlace to (Brock Street. 63 The name " Peter," attached to the street which flanks on the west the ancient homestead and extensive outbuildings of Mr. Crookshank, is a memento of the president or administrator, Peter Russell. It led directly up to Petersfield, Mr. Russell's park lot on Queen Street. We come here to the western boundary of the so-called New Town — the limit of the first important extension of York westward. The limit, eastward, of the New Town, was a thoroughfare known in the former day as Toronto Street, which was one street east of Yonge Street, represented now by Victoria Street. At the period when the plan was designed for this grand western and north-west- em suburb of York, Yonge Street was not opened southward farther than Lot [Queen] Street. The roadway there suddenly veered to the eastward, and then, after a short interval, passed down Toronto Street, a roadway a httle to the west of the existing Victoria Street. The tradition in Boston used to be, that some of the streets there followed the line of accidental cow-paths formed in the olden time in the uncleared bush ; and no doubt other old American towns, like ancient European towns generally, exhibit, in the direction of their thoroughfares, occasionally, traces of casual circumstances in the history of the first settlers on their respective sites. The prac- tice at later periods has been to make all ways run as nearly as possible in right Hnes. In one or two " jogs" or irregularities, ob- servable in the streets of the Toronto of to-day, we have memorials of early waggon trackswhich ran where theymost conveniently could. The slight meandering of Front Street in its course from the garri- son to the site of the first Parliament Buildings, and of Britain Street, (an obscure passage between George Street and CaroUne Street), may be thus explained ; as also the fact that the southern end of the present Victoria Street does not connect immediately with the present Toronto Street. This last-mentioned irregularity is a relic of the time when the great road from the north, namely, Yonge Street, on reaching Queen Street, slanted off to the east- ward across vacant lots and open ground, making by the nearest and most convenient route for the market and the heart of the town. After the laying-out in lots of the region comprehended in the first great expansion of York, of which we have spoken, inquiries were instituted by the authorities as to the improvements made by the 64 Toronto of Old. [§ 2. liolders of each. In the chart accompanying the report of Mr. Stegman, the surveyor appointed to make the examination, the lots are coloured according to the condition of each, and appended are the following curious particulars, which smack somewhat of the ever-memorable town-plot of Eden, to which Martin Chuzzlewit was induced to repair, and which offered a lively picture of an in- fant metropolis in the rough. (We must represent to ourselves a -chequered diagram; some of the squares white or blank; some tinted blue ; some shaded black ; the whole entitled " Sketch of the Part of the Town of York west of Toronto Street.")—" Expla- nation : The blank lots are cleared, agreeable to the notice issued from His Excellency the Lieutenant-Governor, bearing date Sep- tember the fourth, 1800. The lots shaded blue are chiefly cut, but the brush not burnt ; and those marked with the letter A, the brush only cut. The lots shaded black, no work done. The survey made by order of the Surveyor-General's office, bearing date April the 23rd, 1801." A more precise examination appears to have been demanded. The explanations appended to the second plan, which has squares shaded brown, in addition to those coloured tlue and black, are: " ist. The blank lots are cleared. 2nd. The lots shaded black, no work done. 3rd. The lots shaded brown, ihe brush cut and burnt. 4th. The lots shaded blue, the brush cut and not burnt. N.B. The lots i and 2 on the north side of New- gate Street [the site subsequently of the dwelling-house of Jesse Ketchum, of whom hereafter], are mostly clear of the large timber, and some brush cut also, but not burnt; therefore omitted in the first report. This second examination done by order of the Hon- ourable John Elmsley, Esq." The second extension of York westward included the Govern- ment Common. The staking out of streets here was a compara- tively late event. Brock Street, to which we have now approached, had its name, of course, from the General officer slain at Queens- ton, and its extra width from the example set in the Avenue to the north, into which it merges after crossing Queen Street. A little to the west of Brock Street was the old mihtary burying- ground, a clearing in the thick brushwood of the locaUty : of an oblong shape, its four picketed sides directed exactly towards the four cardinal points. The setting off of the neighbouring streets and lots at a different angle, caused the boundary lines of this plot to run askew to every other straight line in the vicinity. Over how § 2.] From the Market Place to (Brock Street. 65 many a now forgotten and even obliterated grave have the custo- mary farewell volleys here been fired !— those final honours to the" soldier, always so touching ; intended doubtless, in the old bar- baric way, to be an incentive to endurance in the sound and well ; and consolatory in anticipation to the sick and dying. In the mould of this old cemetery, what a mingling from distant quarters ! Hearts finally at rest here, fluttered in their last beats, far away, at times, to old familiar scenes " beloved in vain" long ago ; to villages, hedgerows, lanes, fields, in green England and Ireland, in rugged Scotland and Wales. Many a widow, standing at an open grave here, holding the hand of orphan boy or girl, has "wept her soldier dead," not slain in the battle-field, indeed, but fallen, nevertheless, in the discharge of duty, before one or other of the subtle assailants that, even in times of peace, not unfrequently bring the career of the military man to a prema- ture close. Among the remains deposited in this ancient burial- plot are those of a child of the first Governor of Upper Canada, a fact commemorated on the exterior of the mortuary chapel over his own grave in Devonshire, by a tablet on which are the words : " Katharine, born in Upper Canada, i6th Jan., 1793; died and was buried at York Town, in that Province, in 1794." Close to the mihtary burial-ground was once enacted a scene which might have occurred at the obsequies of a Tartar chief in the days of old. Capt. Battersby, sent out to take command of a Pro- vincial corps, was the owner of several fine horses, to which he was greatly attached. On his being ordered home, after the war of 1 81 2, friends and others began to make offers for the purchase of the animals : but no ; he would enter into no treaty with any one on that score. What his decision was became apparent the day before his departure from York. He then had his poor dumb favourites led out by some soldiers to the vicinity of the burying- ground ; and there he caused each of them to be deliberately shot dead. He did not care to entrust to the tender mercies of stran- gers, in the future, those faithful creatures that had served him so well, and had borne him whithersoever he listed, so willingly and bravely. The carcasses were interred on the spot where the shoot- ing had taken place. Returning now again to Brock Street, and placing ourselves at the middle point of its great width — immediately before us to the north, on the ridge which bounds the view in the distance, we dis- E 66 Toronto of Old. [§ 2. cern a white object. -This is Spadina House, from which the ave- nue into which Brock Street passes, takes its name. The word Spadina itself is an Indian term tastefully modified, descriptive of a sudden rise of land like that on which the house in the distance stands. Spadina was the residence of Dr. W. W. Baldwin, to whom reference has already been made. A liberal in his political views, he nevertheless was strongly influenced by the feudal feeling which was a second nature with most persons in the British Islands some years ago. His purpose was to establish in Canada a family, whose head was to be maintained in opulence by the proceeds of an en- tailed estate. There was to be forever a Baldwin of Spadina. It is singular that the first inheritor of the newly-established patrimony should have been the statesman whose lot it was to carry through the Legislature of Canada the abolition of the rights of primogeniture. The son grasped more readily than the father what the genius of the North American continent will endure, and what it will not. Spadina Avenue was laid out by Dr. Baldwin on a scale that would have satisfied the designers of St. Petersburg or Washing- ton. Its width is one hundred and twenty feet. Its length from the water's edge to the base of Spadina Hill would be nearly three miles. Garnished on both sides by a double row of full grown chestnut trees, it would vie in magnificence, when seen from an eminence, with the Long Walk at Windsor. Eastward of Spadina House, on the same elevation of land, was Davenport, the picturesque and chateau-like home of Col. Wells, formerly of the 43rd regiment, built at an early period. Col. Wells was a fine example of the English officer, whom we so often see retiring from the camp gracefully and happily into domestic life. A faithful portrait of him exists, in which he wears the gold medal of Badajoz. His sons, natural artists, and arbiters of taste, in- herited, along with their aesthetic gifts, also lithe and handsome persons. One of them, now, like his father, a Lieutenant-Colonel in the army, was highly distinguished in the Crimea ; and on re- visiting Toronto after the peace with Russia, was publicly presented with a sword of honour. The view of the Lake and intervening forest, as seen from Davenport and Spadina, before the cultiva- tion of the alluvial plain below, was always fine. (On his retire- ment from the army, the second Col. Wells took up his abode at Davenport.) III. FROM BROCK STREET TO THE OLD FRENCH FORT. ; ETURNING again to the front. The portion of the Common that lies immediately west of the foot of Brock Street was enclosed for the first time and orna- mentally planted by Mr. Jameson. Before his remo- val to Canada, Mr. Jameson had filled a judicial posi- tion in the West Indies. In Canada, he was successively Attorney-General and Vice-Chancellor, the Chancellorship itself being vested in the Crown. The conversational powers of Mr. Jameson were admirable : and no slight interest attached to the pleasant talk of one who, in his younger days, had been the familiar associate of Southey, Wordsworth, and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. In a volume of poems by Hartley Coleridge, son of the philosopher, published in 1833, the three sonnets addressed " To a Friend," were addressed to Mr. Jameson, as we are informed in a note. We give the first of these little poems at length : " When we were idlers with the loitering rills, The need of human love we Httle noted : Our love was nature ; and the peace that floated On the white mist, and dwelt upon the hills, To sweet accord subdued our wayward wills : One soul was ours, one mind, one heart devoted, That, wisely doating, asked not why it doated. And ours the unknown joy, which knowing kills. But now I find how dear thou wert to me ; That man is more than half of nature's treasure. Of that fair Beauty which no eye can see, Of that sweet music which no ear can measure ; 68 Toronto of Old. [§ 3, And now the streams may sing for others' pleasure, The hills sleep on in their eternity.'' The note appended, which appears only in the first edition, is as follows : " This sonnet, and the two following, my earliest attempts at that form of versification, were addressed to R. S. Jame- son, Esq., on occasion of meeting him in London, after a separa- tion of some years. He was the favourite companion of my boy- hood, the active friend and sincere counsellor of my youth. ' Though seas between us broad ha' roU'd' since we ' travelled side by side' last, I trust the sight of this little volume will give rise to recollections that will make him ten years younger. He is now Judge Advocate at Dominica, and husband of Mirs. Jameson, authoress of the ' Diary of an Ennuy6e,' ' Loves of the Poets,' and other agreeable productions." Mr. Jameson was a man of high culture and fine literary tastes. He was, moreover, an amateur artist of no ordinary skill, as extant drawings of his in water-colours attest. His countenance, especi- ally in his old age, was of the Jeremy Bentham stamp. It was from the house on the west of Brock Street that Mrs. Jameson dated the letters which constitute her well-known " Winter Studies and Summer Rambles.'' That volume thus closes : " At three o'clock in the morning, just as the moon was setting on Lake Ontario, I arrived at the door of my own house in Toronto, having been absent on this wild expedition [to the Sault] just two months." York had then been two years Toronto. (For having ventured to pass down the rapids at the Sault, she had been formally named by the Otchipways of the locality, Was-sa-Je-wun- e-qua, " Woman of the Bright Stream." The Preface to the American edition of Mrs. Jameson's "Cha- racteristics of Women" was also written here. In that Introduc- tion we can detect a touch due to the " wild expedition'' just spoken of " They say," she observes, " that as a savage proves his heroism by displaying in grim array the torn scalps of his ene- mies, so a woman thinks she proves her virtue by exhibiting the mangled reputations of her friends :" a censure, she adds, which is just, but the propensity, she explains, is wrongly attributed to ill-nature and jealousy. "Ignorance," she proceeds, "is the main cause ; ignorance of ourselves and others ; and when I have heard any female acquaintance commenting with a spiteful or a sprightly levity on the delinquencies and mistakes of their sex, I have only § 3-] From (Brock Street to the Old French Fort. 69 said to myself, ' They know not what they do.'" " Here, then," the Preface referred to concludes, " I present to women a little elementary manual or introduction to that knowledge of woman, in which they may learn to understand better their own nature ; to judge more justly, more gently, more truly of each other ; ' And in the silent hour of inward thought To still suspect, yet still revere themselves In lowhness of heart. ' " Mrs. Jameson was unattractive in person at first sight, although, as could scarcely fail to be the case in one so highly endowed, her features, separately considered, were fine and boldly marked. In- tellectually, she was an enchantress. Besides an originality and independence ot judgment on most subjects, and a facility in gene- ralizing and reducing thought to the form of a neat aphorism, she had a strong and capacious memory, richly furnished with choice things. Her conversation was consequently of the most fascinat- ing kind. She sang, too, in sweet taste, with a quiet softness, without dis- play. She sketched from nature with great elegance, and designed cleverly. The seven or eight illustrations which appear in the American edition of the " Characteristics," dated at Toronto, are etched by herself, and bear her autograph, " Anna." The same is to be observed of the illustrations in the English edition of her " Commonplace Book of Thoughts, Memories, and Fancies ;" and in her larger volumes on various Art-subjects. She had super- eminently beautiftil hands, which she always scrupulously guarded fi-om contract with the outer air. Mrs. Jameson was a connoisseur in " hands," as we gather from her Commonplace Book, just mentioned. She there says ; " There are hands of various character ; the hand to catch, and the hand to hold ; the hand to clasp, and the hand to grasp ; the hand that has worked, or could work, and the hand that has never done any- thing but hold itself out to be kissed, like that of Joanna of Arra- gon, in Raphael's picture." Her own appeared to belong to the last-named class. Though the merest trifles, we may record here one or two fiir- ther personal recollections of Mrs. Jameson ; of her appreciation, for example, of a very obvious quotation fi-om Horace, to be ap- pended to a little sketch of her own, representing a child asleep. 70 Toronto of Old. [§ 3, but in danger from a serpent near ; and of her glad acceptance of an out-of-the-way scrap from the " Vanity of Arts and Sciences" of Cornelius Agrippa, which proved the antiquity of charivaries. " Do you not know that the intervention of a lady's hand is requi- site to the finish of a young man's education ?" was a suggestive question drawn forth by some youthful maladroitness. Another characteristic dictum, "Society is one vast masquerade of manners," is remembered, as having been probably at the time a new idea to ourselves in particular. The irrational conventionalities of so- ciety she persistently sought to counteract, by her words on suitable occasions, and by her example, especially in point of dress, which did not conform to the customs in vogue. Among the local characters relished by Mrs. Jameson in Can- ada was Mr. Justice Hagerman, who added some of the bluntness of Samuel Johnson to the physique of Charles James Fox. She set a high value on his talents, although we have heard her, at once playfully and graphically, speak of him as " that great mastiff, Hagerman." From Mrs. Jameson we learned that " Gaytay'' was a sufficient approximation in English to the pronunciation of " Goethe." She had been intimately acquainted with the poet at Weimar. In the Kensington Museum there is a bust, exceedingly fine, of Mrs. Jameson, by the celebrated sculptor Gibson, executed l)y him, as the inscription speaks, " in her honour." The head and coun- tenance are of course somewhat idealized ; but the likeness is well retained. In the small Boston edition of the "Legends of the Ma- donna" there is an interesting portrait of Mrs. Jameson, giving her appearance when far advanced in years. Westward from the house and grounds whose associations have detained us so long, the space that was known as the Government Common is now traversed from south to north by two streets. Their names possess some interest, the first of them being that of the Duke of Portland, Viceroy of Ireland, Colonial Secretary, and three times Prime Minister in the reign of George the Third ; the other that of Earl Bathurst, Secretary for the Colonies in George the Fourth's time. Eastward of Bathurst Street, in the direction of the military bury- ing-ground, there was long marked out by a furrow in the sward the ground-plan of a church. In 1830, the military chaplain, Mr. Hudson, addressed to the commander of the forces a complaint § 3-] From (Brock Street to the Old French Fort. 71 "of the very great inconveniece to which the troops are exposed in having to march so far to the place of worship, particularly when the weather and roads are so unfavourable during a greater part of the year in this country, the distance from the Barracks to the Church being two miles :" adding, " In June last, the roads were in such a state as to prevent the Troops from attending Church for four successive Sundays." He then suggested "the propriety of erecting a chapel on die Government reserve for the accommoda- tion of the Troops." The Horse Guards refused to undertake the erection of a chapel here, but made a donation of one thousand pounds towards the re-edification of St. James' Church, " on con- dition that accommodation should be permanently provided for His Majesty's Troops." The outline in the turf was a relic of Mr. Hudson's suggestion. The line that defined the limit of the Government Common to the north and east, (and west, of course, likewise), prior to its divi- sion into building lots, was a portion of the circumference of a great circle, " of a radius of a 1,000 yards, more or less," whose centre was the Fort. On the old plans of York, acres of this great circle are traced, with two interior concentric arcs, of radii respect- ively of eight and five hundred yards. We now soon arrive at the ravine of the " Garrison Creek." In the rivulet below, for some distance up the valley, before the clear- ing away of the woods, salmon used to be taken at certain seasons of the year. Crossing the stream, and ascending to the arched gateway of the fort, ( we are speaking of it as it used to be), we pass between the strong iron-studded portals, which are thrown back : we pass a sentry just within the gate, and the guard-house on the left. At present we do not tarry within the enclosure of the Fort. We simply glance at the loopholed block-house on the one side, and the quarters of the men, the officers, and the command- ant'on the other ; and we hurry across the gravelled area, recalling rapidly a series of spirit-stirring ordinal numbers — 40th, 41st, 68th, 79th, 42nd, isth, 32nd, ist — each suggestive of a gallant assem- blage at some time here ; of a vigorous, finely disciplined, ready- aye-ready group, that, like the successive generations on the stage of human life, came and went just once, as it were — as the years rolled on, and the eye saw them again no more. We pass on through the western gate to the large open green space which lies on the farther side. This is the Garrison Reserve. 72 Toronto of Old. [§ 3. It bears the same relation to the modem Toronto and the ancient York as the Plains of Abraham do to Quebec. It was here that the struggle took place, in the olden time, that led to the capture of the town. In both cases the leader of the aggressive expedition " fell victorious." But the analogy holds no further; as, in the case of the inferior conquest, the successful power did not retain permanent possession. The Wolfe's Cove — the landing-place of the invader — on the occasion referred to, was just within the curve of the Humber Bay, far to the west, where Queen Street now skirts the beach for a short distance and then emerges on it. The intention had been to land more to the eastward, but the vessels containing the hos- tile force were driven westward by the winds. The debarkation was opposed by a handful of Indians, under Major Givins. The Glengary Fencibles had been despatched to aid in this service, but, attempting to approach the spot by a back road, they lost their way. A tradition exists that the name of the Grenadier's Pond, a lagoon a little to the west, one of the ancient outlets of the waters of the Humber, is connected with the dis- astrous bewilderment of a party of the regular troops at this critical period. It is at the same time asserted that the name " Grena- dier's Pond" was familiar previously. At length companies of the Eighth Regiment, of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment, and of Incorporated Militia, made their appearance on the ground, and disputed the progress inland of the enemy. After suffering severely, they retired towards the Fort. This was the existing Fort. The result is now matter of history, and need not be detailed. As por- tions of the cliff have fallen away from time to time along the shore here, numerous skeletons have been exposed to view, relics of friend and foe slain on the adjacent common, where, also, military orna- ments and fragments of fire-arms, used frequently to be dug up. Some of the bones referred to, however, may have been remains of early French and Indian traders. The Z(yfflto newspaper of May 9, 1829, published at York, speaks of the re-interment on that day of the remains of an officer killed at the battle of York. The article runs as follows : — " The late Capt. McNeil. — It will be recollected by many of the inhabi- tants of York that this officer fell while gallantly fighting at the head of his Company of Grenadiers of the 8th Regiment, in defence of the place, on the morning of the 27th of April, 1813. His I 3.] From (Brock Street to the Old French Fort. 73 remains which so eminently deserved rites of honourable sepul- ture, were from unavoidable circumstances consigned to earth by the hands of the enemy whom he was opposing, near the spot where he fell, without any of those marks of distinction which are paid to departed valour. " The waters of the Lake," the Loyalist then proceeds to say, " having lately made great inroads upon the bank, and the grave being in danger of being washed away, it may be satisfactory to his friends to learn, that on these circumstances being made known to Major Winniett, commanding the 68th Regiment at this Post, he promptly authorized the necessary measures to be taken for removing the remains of Capt. McNeil, and placing them in the Garrison Burial Ground, which was done this day. A firing-party and the band attended on the occasion, and the remains were fol- lowed to the place of interment by the officers of the Garrison, and a procession of the inhabitants of the town and vicinity." The site of the original French stockade, estabhshed here in the middle of the last century, was nearly at the middle point between the landing-place of the United States force in 1813, and the exist- ing Fort. West of the white cut-stone Barracks, several earth- works and grass-grown excavations still mark the spot. These ruins, which we often visited when they were much more exten- sive and conspicuous than they are now, were popularly designated "The Old French Fort." It is interesting to observe the probable process by which the appellation " Toronto" ^came to be attached to the Trading-post here. Its real name, as imposed by the French authorities, was Fort Rouill6, from a French colonial minister of that name, in 1 749-54. This we learn from a despatch of M. de Longeuil, Gov- ernor-in-Chief of Canada in 1752. And "Toronto," at that period, according to contemporaneous maps, denoted Lake Sim- coe and the surrounding region. Thus in Carver's Travels through North America in 1766-8, in p. 172, we read, " On the north- west part of this lake [Ontario], and to the south of Lake Huron, is a tribe of Indians called the Mississagu^s, whose town is denomi- nated Toronto, from the lake [/. e. Lake Simcoe] on which it lies, but they are not very numerous." This agrees with Lahontan's statements and map, in 1687. What Carver says of the fewness of the native inhabitants is ap- plicable only to the state of things in his day. The fatal irruption 74 Toronto of Old. [§ 3. of the Iroquois from the south had then taken place, and the whole of the Lake Simcoe or Toronto region had been made a desert. Before that irruption, the peninsula included between Notawasaga Bay, Matchedash, or Sturgeon Bay, the River Severn, Lake Cou- chichin and Lake Simcoe was a locality largely frequented by native tribes. It was especially the head-quarters of the Wyandots or Hurons. Villages, burial-grounds, and cultivated lands abounded in it. Unusual numbers of the red men were congregated there. It was in short the place of meeting, the place of concourse, the populous region, indicated by the Huron term Toronto. In the form Toronton, the word Toronto is given by Gabriel Sa- gard in his " Dictionnaire de la Langue Huronne," published at Paris in 1636. With Sagard it is a kind of exclamation, signifying " II y en a beaucoup," and it is used in relation to men. He cites as an ex- ample — " He has killed a number of S. (the initial of some hos- tile tribe)." " Toronton S. ahouyo." In the "Vocabulary of Huron words at the end of Lahontan's second volume, the term likewise appears, but with a prefix, — A- toronton, — and is translated " Beaucoup." Sagard gives it with the prefix O, in the phrase " 0-toronton dacheniquoy," "J'en mange beaucoup." We are not indeed to suppose that the Hurons employed the term Toronto as a proper name. We know that the abori- gines used for the most part no proper names of places, in our sense of the word, their local appellations being simply brief de- scriptions or allusion to incidents. But we are to suppose that the early white men took notice of the vocable Toronto, frequently and emphatically uttered by their red companions, when pointing towards the Lake Simcoe region, or when pressing on in canoe or on foot, to reach it. Accordingly, at length, the vocable Toronto is caught up by the white voyageurs, and adopted as a local proper name in the Euro- pean sense : just as had been the case already with the word Can- ada. (" Kanata" was a word continually heard on the lips of the red men in the Lower St Lawrence, as they pointed to the shore ; they simply meant to indicate — " Yonder are our wigwams ;" but the French mariners and others took the expression to be a geographi- cal name for the new region which they were penetrating. And such it has become.) § 3-] From fBrock Street to the Old French Fort. 75 We can now also see how it came to pass that the term Toronto was attached to a particular spot on the shore of Lake Ontario. The mouth of the Humber, or rather a point on the eastern side of the indentation known as Humber Bay, was the landing place of hunting parties, trading parties, war-parties, on their way to the populous region in the vicinity of Lake Simcoe. Here they dis- embarked for the tramp to Toronto. This was a Toronto landing- place for wayfarers bound to the district in the interior where there were crowds. And gradually the starting-place took the name ot the goal. The style and title of the terminus ad quem were usurped by the terminus k quo. Thus likewise it happened that the stockaded trading-post estab- lished near the landing on the indentation of Humber Bay came to be popularly known as Fort Toronto, although its actual, official name was Fort Rouille. In regard to the signification which by some writers has been assigned to the word Toronto, of " trees rising out of the water" — we think the interpretation has arisen from a misunderstanding of language used by Indian canoe-men. Indian canoe-men in coasting along the shore of Lake Ontario from the east or west, would, we may conceive, naturally point to " the trees rising out of the water," the pines and black poplars looming up from the Toronto island or peninsula, as a familiar lafid-mark by which they knew the spot where they were to disem- bark for the " populous region to the north." The white men mixing together in their heads the description of the landmark and the district where, as they were, emphatically told, there were crowds, made out of the expressions "trees rising out of the water," and " Toronto," convertible terms, which they were not. As to the idea to which Capt. Bonnycastle gave currency, by re- cording it in one of his books on Canada, that Toronto, or Tarento was possibly the name of an Italian engineer concerned in the construction of the fort, — it is sufficient to reply that we know what the official name of the Fort was : it was Fort Rouille. Sorel, and Chambly, and it may be, other places in Canada, derived their names from officers in the French service. But nothing to be found in the early annals of the country gives any countenance to Capt. Bonnycastle's derivation. It was probably a mere after- dinner conversational conjecture, and it ought never to have been gravely propounded. 76 Toronto of Old. [§ 3. We meet with Toronto under several different forms, in the French and English documents ; but the variety has evidently arisen from the attempts of men of different degrees of literary capacity and qualification, to represent, each as he best could, a native vocable which had not been long reduced to writing. The same variety, and from the same cause, occurs in a multitude of other aboriginal terms. The person who first chanced to write down Toronto as Tarento was probably influenced by some previous mental familiarity with the name of an old Italian town ; just as he who first startled Euro- peans by the announcement that one of the Iroquois nations was composed of Senecas, was doubtless helped to the familiar-looking term which he adopted, by a thought of the Roman stoic. (Pownall says Seneca is properly Sen-aga, " the farther people," that is in relation to the New England Indians ; while Mohawk is Mo-aga " the hither people.'' Neither of the terms was the name borne by the tribe. According to the French rendering, the Mo-agas were Agni6s ; the Sen-agas Tsonnontouans.) The chivalrous and daring La Salle must have rested for a mo- ment at the Toronto Landing. In his second expedition to the West, in 1680, he made his way from Fort Frontenac to Michili- mackinac by the portage from the mouth of what is now the Hum- ber to Lake Huron, accompanied by a party of twenty-four men. In the preceding year he had penetrated to the Mississippi by the Lake Erie route. But then also some of his company unex- pectedly found themselves in close proximity to Toronto. The Franciscan Friar, Hennepin, sent forward by La Salle from Fort Frontenac with seventeen men, was compelled by stress of weather, while coasting along the north side of Lake Ontario, to take shel- ter in the Humber river. It was then the 26th of Nov. (1678) ; and here he was delayed until the 5th of December. Hennepin speaks of the place of his detention as Taiaiagon : a word errone- ously taken to be a local proper name. It means as we are assured by one formerly familiar with the native Indians, simply a Portage or Landing-place. So that there were numerous Taiaiagons. One is noted in particular, situated, the Gazetteer of 1799 says, "half way between York and the head of the Bay of Quint! :" probably where Port Hope now stands. It is marked in the old French maps in that position. (On one of them a track is drawn from it to " Lac Taronth6 ;" that is to the chain of Lakes leading north- § 3-] From (Brock Street to the Old French Fort. 77 westerly to Lake Toronto, i. e. Lake Siracoe.) The Taiaiagon of Hennepin is stated by him to be " at the farther end of Lake On- tario," and "about seventy leagues from Fort Frontenac :'' too far, of course. Again : the distance from Taiaiagon to the mouth of the Niagara river, is made by him to be fifteen or sixteen leagues ; also too far, if Toronto is the site of his Taiaiagon. IV. FROM THE. GARRISON BACK TO THE PLACE OF BEGINNING. i E now enter again the modern Fort ; passing back through the western gate. On our right we have the site of the magazine which so fatally exploded in 1813 ; we learn from Gen. Sheafife's despatch to Sir George Prevost, that it was " in the western battery.' ^j^„ In close proximity to the magazine was the Government i'i& House of the day, an extensive rambling cluster of one- storey buildings ; all " riddled" or shattered to pieces by the con- cussion, when the explosion took place. The ruin that thus befel the Governor's residence led, on the restoration ot peace, to the purchase of Chief Justice Elmsley's house on King street, and its conversion into " Government House." From the main battery, which (including a small semi-circular bastion for the venerable flag-staff of the Fort) extends along the brow of the palisaded bank, south of the parade, the royal salutes, resounding down and across the lake, used to be fired on the arrival and departure of the Lieutenant-Governor, and at the open- ing and closing of the Legislature. From the south-eastern bastion, overlooking the ravine below, a twelve-pounder was discharged every day at noon. " The twelve- o'clock gun," when discontinued, was long missed with regret. At the time of the invasion of Canada in 1812, the garrison of York was manned by the 3rd regiment of York militia. We have before us a relic of the period, in the form of the contemporary regimental order-book of the Fort. An entry of the 29th of July, 181 2, showing the approach of serious work, has an especial local § 4-] From the Garrison back to the (Beginning. 79 interest. " In consequence of an order from Major-General Brock, commanding the forces, for a detachment of volunteers, under the command of Major Allan, to hold themselves in readiness to pro- ceed in batteaux from the Head of the Lake to-morrow at 2 o'clock, the following officers, non-commissioned officers and privates will hold themselves in readiness to proceed at 2 o'clock, for the pur- pose of being fitted with caps, blankets and haversacks, as well as to draw provisions. On their arrival at the Head of the Lake, regimental coats and canteens will be ready to be issued to them." The names are then given. " Capt. Heward, Lieut. Richard- son, Lieut. Jarvis, Lieut. Robinson. Sergeants Knott, Humber- stone. Bond, Bridgeford." In view of the test to which the citizen-soldiers were about to be subjected, the General, like a good officer, sought by judicious praise, to inspire them with self-confidence. "Major-General Brock," the order-book proceeds, " has desired me (Captain Ste- phen Heward) to acquaint the detachment under my command, of his high approbation of their orderly conduct and good disci- pline while under arms : that their exercise and marching far ex- ceeded any that he had seen in the Province. And in particular he directed me to acquaint the officers how much he is pleased with their appearance in uniform and their perfect knowledge of their duty." On the 13th of August, we learn from other sources. Brock was on the Western Frontier with 700 soldiers, including the volunteers from York, and 600 Indians ; and on the i6th the old flag was waving from the fortress of Detroit; but, on the 13th October, the brave General, though again a victor in the engagement, was himself a lifeless corpse on the slopes above Queenston ; and, in April of the following year, York, as we have already seen, was in the hands of the enemy. Such are the ups and downs of war. It is mentioned that " Push on the York Volunteers !" was the order issuing from the lips of the General, at the moment of the fatal shot. From the order-book referred to, we learn that " To- ronto'" was the parole or countersign of the garrison on the 23rd July, 181 2. The knoll on the east side of the Garrison Creek was covered with a number of buildings for the accommodation of troops, in addition to the barracks within the fort. Here also stood a block- house. Eastward were the surgeon's quarters, overhanging the 8o Toronto of Old. [§ 4. bay ; and further eastward still, were the commandant's quarters, a structure popularly known, by some freak of military language, as Lambeth Palace. Here for a time resided Major-General ^neas Shaw, afterwards the owner and occupant of Oak Hill. On the beach below the knoll, there continued to be, for a num- ber of years, a row of cannon dismounted, duly spiked and other- wise disabled, memorials of the capture in 1813, when these guns were rendered useless by the regular troops before their retreat to Kingston. The pebbles on the shore about here were also plentifully mixed with loose canister shot, washed up by the waves, after their submersion in the bay on the same occa- sion. From the little eminence just referred to, along the edge of the cliff, ran a gravel walk, which led first to the Guard House over the Commissariat Stores, in a direct line, with the exception of a slight divergence occasioned by " Capt. Bonnycastle's cottage ;" and then eastward into the town. Where ravines occurred, cut in the drift by water-courses into the bay, the gulf was spanned by a bridge of hewn logs. This walk, kept in order for many years by the mili- tary authorities, was the representative of the path first worn bare by the soft tread of the Indian. From its agreeableness, over- looking as it did, through its whole length the Harbour and Lake, this walk gave birth to the idea, which became a fixed one in the minds of the early people of the place, that there was to be in per- petuity, in front of the whole town, a pleasant promenade, on which the burghers and their families should take the air and dis- port themselves generally. The Royal Patent by which this sentimental walk is provided for and decreed, issued on the 14th day of July, in the year 1818, designates it by the interesting old name of Mall, and nominates " John Beverley Robinson, William Allan, George Crookshank, Duncan Cameron and Grant Powell, all of the town of York, Esqs., their heirs and assigns forever, as trustees to hold the same for the use and benefit of the inhabitants." Stretching from Peter Street in the west to the Reserve for Government Buildings in the east, of a breadth varying between four and five chains, following the line of Front Street on the one side, and the several ' turnings and windings of the bank on the other, the area of land contained in this Mall was " thirty acres, more or less, with allowance for the several cross streets leading from the said town to the water." The § 4-] FfO'in the Garrison back to the (Beginning. 8 1 paucity of open squares in the early plans of York may be partly accounted for by this provision made for a spacious Public Walk. While the archaeologist must regret the many old landmarks which were ruthlessly shorn away in the construction of the modern Esplanade, he must, nevertheless, contemplate with never-ceasing admiration that great and laudable work. It has done for Toronto what the Thames embankment has effected for London. Besides vast sanitary advantages accruing, it has created space for the erec- tion of a new front to the town. It has made room for a broad promenade some two or three miles in length, not, indeed, of the far niente type, but with double and treble railway tracks abreast of itself, all open to the deep water of the harbour on one side, and flanked almost throughout the whole length on the other, by a series of warehouses, mills, factories and dep6ts, destined to increase every year in importance. The sights and sounds every day, along this combination of roadways and its surroundings, are unlike any- thing dreamt of by the framers of the old Patent of 1818. But it cannot be said that the idea contained in that document has been wholly departed from : nay, it must be confessed that it has been grandly realized in a manner and on a scale adapted to the require- ments of these latter days. For some time. Front Street, above the Esplanade, continued to be a raised terrace, from which pleasant views and fresh lake air could be obtained ; and attempts were made, at several points along its southern verge, to establish a double row of shade trees, which should recall in future ages the primitive oaks and elms which overlooked the margin of the harbour. But soon the erection of tall buildings on the newly-made land below, began to shut out the view and the breezes, and to discourage attempts at ornamentation by the planting of trees. It is to regretted, however, that the title of Mall has not yet been applied to some public walk in the town. Old-world sounds like these — reeve, warden, provost, recorder. House of Commons, rail- way, (not road), dugway, mall — like the chimes in some of our towers, and the sung-service in some of our churches — help, in cases where the imagination is active, to reconcile the exile from the British Islands to his adopted home, and even to attach him to it. Incorporated into our common local speech, and so per- petuated, they may also be hereafter subsidiary mementoes of our F 82 Toronto of Old. [§ 4. descent as a people, when all connection, save that of history, with the ancient home of our forefathers, will have ceased. In 1804, there were " Lieutenants of Counties" in Upper Canada. The following gentlemen were, in 1804, " Lieutenants of Coun- ties" for the Counties attached to their respective names. We take the list from the Upper Canada Almanac for 1804, published at York by John Bennett. The office and title of County-Lieu- tenant do not appear to have been kept up: "John Macdonell, Esq., Glengary; William Fortune, Esq., Prescott; Archibald Mac- donell, Esq., Stormont; Hon. Richard Duncan, Esq., Dundas; Peter Drummond, Esq., Grenville; James Breakenridge, Esq., Leeds; Hon. Richard Cartwright, Esq., Frontenac; Hazelton. Spencer, Esq., Lenox; William Johnson, Esq., Addington; John Ferguson, Esq., Hastings; Archibald Macdonell, Esq., of Marys- burg, Prince Edward; Alexander Chisholm, Esq., Northumber- land; Robert Baldwin, Esq., Durham; Hon. David William Smith, Esq., York; Hon. Robert Hamilton, Esq., Lincoln; Samuel Ryerse, Esq., Norfolk; William Claus, Esq., Oxford; (Middlesex is vacant); Hon. Alexander Grant, Esq., Essex; Hon. James Baby, Esq., Kent." Another old English term in use in the Crown Lands Office of Ontario, if not generally, is " Domesday Book." The record of grants of land from the beginning of the organization of Upper Canada is entitled " Domesday Book." It consists now of many folio volumes. The gravelled path from the Fort to the Commissariat Stores, as described above, in conjunction with a parallel track for wheels along the cliff all the way to the site of the Parliament Buildings, suggested in 1822 the restoration of a carriage-drive to the Island, which had some years previously existed. This involved the erec- tion or rather re-erection of bridges over the lesser and greater Don, to enable the inhabitants of York to reach the long lines of lake beach, extending eastward to Scarborough Heights and west- ward to Gibraltar Point. All the old accounts of York in the topographical dictionaries of " sixty years since," spoke of the salubriousness of the peninsula which formed the harbour. Even the aborigines, it was stated, had recourse to that spot for sanative purposes. All this was derived from the article in D. W. Smith's Gazetteer, which sets forth that " the long beach or peninsula, which affords a most W" if'!'** § 4-] Ffoi^ the Garrison back to the beginning. 83 delightful ride, is considered so healthy by the Indians, that they resort to it whenever indisposed." So early as 1806 a bridge or float had been built over the mouth of the Don. In the Gazette of June 18, in that year, we have the notice : " It is requested that no person will draw sand or pass with loaded waggons or carts over the new Bridge or Float at the opening of the Don River, as this source of communication was intended to accommodate the inhabitants of the town in a walk or ride to the Island. York, 13th June, 1806." In a MS. map of this portion of the vicinity of York, dated 181 1, the road over the float is marked " Road from York to the Lighthouse." In this map, the lesser Don does not appear. A pond or inlet represents it, stretching in from the bay to the river. A bridge spans the inlet. There is a bridge also over the ravine, through which flows the rivulet by the ParHament Buildings. Health, howfever, was not the sole object of all these arrange- ments. A race-course had been laid out on the sandy neck of land connecting the central portion of the peninsula with the main shore. Here races were periodically held ; and we have been assured, by an eye-witness, that twelve fine horses at a time had been seen by him engaged in the contest of speed. The hippo- drome in question was not a ring, but a long straight level stadium, extending from the southern end of the second bridge to the outer margin of the lake. When invasion was threatened in 181 2, all the bridges in the direction of the Island were taken down. An earthwork was thrown up across the narrow ridge separating the last long reach of the Don from the Bay ; and in addition, a trench was cut across the same ridge. This cut, at first insignificant, became ultimately by a natural process the lesser Don, a deep and wide outlet, a convenient short-cut for skiffs and canoes from the Bay to the Don proper, and from the Don proper to the Bay. On the return of peace, the absence of bridges, and the exist- ence, in addition, of a second formidable water-filled moat, speed- ily began to be matters of serious regret to the inhabitants of York, who found themselves uncomfortably cut off from easy access to the peninsula. From the Gazette of April 15, 1822, we learn that "a public subscription among the inhabitants had been entered into, to defray the expense of erecting two bridges on the River Don, leading from this town towards the south, to the 84 Toronto of Old. [§ 4. Peninsula." And subjoined are the leading names of the place, guaranteeeing various sums, in all amounting to ;£^io8 5s. The timber was presented by Peter Robinson, Esq., M.P.P. The estimated expense of the undertaking was £2>2S- The fol- lowing names appear for various sums — fifty, twenty, ten, five and two dollars — Major Hillier, Rev. Dr. Strachan, Hon. J. H. Dunn, Hon. James Baby, Mr. Justice Boulton, John Small, Henry Boul- ton. Col. Coffin, Thomas Ridout, sen., W. Allen, Grant Powell, Samuel Ridout, J. S. Baldwin, S. Heward, James E. Small, Chas. Small, S. Washburn, J. B. Macaulay, G. Crookshank, A. Mercer, George Boulton, Thomas Taylor, Joseph Spragge, George Hamil- ton, R. E. Prentice, A. Warffe, W. B. Jarvis, B. Turquand, John Denison, sen., George Denison, John and George Monro, Henry Drean, Peter McDougall, Geo. Duggan, James Nation, Thomas Bright, W. B. Robinson, J. W. Gamble, William Proudfoot, Jesse Ketchum, D. Brooke, jun., R. C. Henderson, David Stegman, L. Fairbairn, Geo. Playter, Joseph Rogers, John French, W. Roe, Thomas Sullivan, John Hay, J. Biglow, John Elliot. On the strength of the sums thus promised, an engineer, Mr. E. Angell, began the erection of the bridge over the Greater Don. The Gazette before us reports that it was being constructed " with hewn timbers, on the most approved European principle." (There is point in the italicised word : it hints the impoHcy of employing United States engineers for such works). The paper adds that " the one bridge over the Great Don, consisting of five arches, is in a forward state ; and the other, of one arch, over the Little Don, will be completed in or before the month of July next, when this line of road will be opened." It is subjoined that " subscrip- tions will continue to be received by A. Mercer, Esq., J. Dennis, York, and also by the Committee, Thomas Bright, William Smith and E. Angell." By the Weekly Register of June 19, in the following year, it appears that the engineer, in commencing the bridge before the amount of its cost was guaranteed, had calculated without his host; and, as is usually the case with those who draw in advance on the proceeds of a supposed public enthusiam, had been brought into difficulties. We accordingly find that " on Friday evening last, pursuant to public notice given in the Upper Canada Gazette, a meeting of the subscribers, and other inhabitants of the town of York, was held at the house of Mr. Phair, in the Market-place, for § 4-] From the Garrison back to the (Beginning. 85 the purpose of taking into consideration the circumstances in which the engineer had been placed by constructing a bridge, the charge of which was to be defrayed by voluntary subscription, over the mouth of the river Don.'' Resolutions were passed on the occasion, approving of Mr. Angell's proceedings, and caUing for additional donations. A new committee was now appointed, consisting of H. J. Boulton, Esq., Dr. Widmer, S. Heward, Esq., Charles Small, Esq., and Allan McNab, Esq.— The editor of the Weekly Register {Vo\htxgil\) thus notices the meeting: "It is satisfactory to find that there is at length some probability of the bridge over the Don in this vicinity being completed. We are, ourselves," the writer of the article proceeds to say, " the more anxious on this account, from the hope there is reason to entertain that these and other improvements in the neighbourhood will eventually lead to a draining of the great marsh at the east end of this town ; for until that is done, it is utterly impossible that the place can be healthy at all seasons of the year. The public are not sufficiently impressed with the alarm- ing insalubrity of such situations. We beg to refer our readers,'' the editor of the Register then observes, " to a very interesting letter from Dr. Priestly to Sir John Pringle in the Philosophical Transactions for 1777 ; and another from Dr. Price to Dr. Horsley in the same work in 1774 ; both on this subject, which throw con- siderable light upon it." And it is added, '' We have it in contem- plation to republish these letters in this work, as being highly interesting to many persons, and applicable to various situations in this country, but particularly to the neighbourhood of York." The desired additional subscriptions do not appear to have come in. The works at the mouth of the Don proper were brought to a stand-still. The bridge over the Lesser Don was not commenced. Thus matters remained for the long interval of ten years. Every inhabitant of York, able to indulge in the luxury of a carriage, or a saddle horse, ^or given to [extensive pedestrian excursions, conti- nued to regret the inaccessibleness of the peninsula. Especially among the families of the military, accustomed to the surroundings of sea-coast towns at home, did the desire exist, to be able, at will, to take a drive, or a canter, or a vigorous constitutional, on the sands of the peninsula, where, on the one hand, the bold escarpments in the distance to the eastward, on the other, the ocean-like horizon, and immediately in front the long rollers of surf tumbling in, all 86 Toronto of Old. [§ 4. helped to stir recollections of (we will suppose) Dawlish or Tor- quay. In 1834, through the intervention of Sir John Colbome, and by means of a subsidy from the military chest, the works on both out- lets of the Don were re-commenced. In 1835 the bridges were completed. On the 22nd of August in that year they were handed over by the military authorities to the town, now no longer York, but Toronto. Some old world formalities were observed on the occasion. The civic authorities approached the new structure in procession; a barricade at the first bridge arrested their progress. A guard sta- tioned there also forbade further advance. The officer in com- mand, Capt. Bonnycastle, appears, and the Mayor and Corpora- tion are informed that the two bridges before them are, by the command of the Lieutenant-Governor, presented to them as a free gift, for the benefit of the inhabitants, that they may in all time to come be enabled to enjoy the salubrious air of the peninsula; the only stipulation being that the bridges should be free of toll for- ever to the troops, stores, and ordnance of the sovereign. The mayor, who, as eye-witnesses report, was arrayed in an offi- cial robe of purple velvet lined with scarlet, read the following reply: "Sir — On the part of His Majesty's faithful and loyal city of Toronto, I receive at your hands the investiture of these bridges, erected by command of His Excellency the Lieutenant-Governor, and now delivered to the Corporation for the benefit and accom- modation of the citizens. In the name of the Common Council and the citizens of Toronto, I beg you to convey to His Excellency the grateful feeUngs with which this new instance of the bounty of our most gracious sovereign is received ; and I take this occasion on behalf of the city to renew our assurances of loyalty and attachment to His Majesty's person and government, and to pray, through His Excellency, a continuance of royal favour towards this city. I have, on the part of the corporation and citizens, to request you to assure His Excellency the Lieutenant-Governor that His Excellency's desire and generous exertions for the health and welfare of the inhabitants of this city are duly and gratefully appreciated ; and I beg you to convey to His Excellency the best wishes of myself and my fellow-citizens for the health and happiness of His Excellency and family. Permit me. Sir, for myself and brethren, to thank you for the very handsome and complimentary manner in § 4-] From the Garrison back to the 'Beginning. 87 which you have carried His Excellency's commands into execu- tion." " Immediately," the narrative of the ceremonial continues, " the band, who were stationed on the bridge, struck up the heart-stirring air, ' God save the King,' during the performance of which the gen- tlemen of the Corporation, followed by a large number of the inha- bitants, passed uncovered over the bridge. Three cheers were then given respectively for the King, for His Excellency the Lieutenant- Governor, for the Mayor and Council of the City of Toronto, and for Capt. Bonnycastle. The gentlemanly and dignified manner in which both the addresses were read did credit to the gentlemen on whom these duties devolved; and the good order and good humour that prevailed among the spectators present were exceedingly gra- tifying." We take this account fi-om the Toronto Patriot of August 28th, 183 s, wherein it is copied from the Christian Guardian. Mr. R. B. Sullivan, the official representative of the city on the occasion just described, was the second mayor of Toronto. He was after- wards one of the Judges of the Court of Common Pleas. The bridges thus ceremoniously presented and received had a short-lived existence. They were a few years afterwards, seriously damaged during the breaking up of the ice, and then carried away bodily in one of the spring freshets to which the Don is subject. The peninsula in front of York was once plentifully stocked with goats, the offspring of a small colony estabhshed by order of Governor Hunter, at Gibraltar Point, for the sake, for one thing, of the supposed salutary nature of the whey of goat's milk. These animals were dispersed during the war of 1812-13. Governor Hunter may have taken the idea of peopling the island at York with goats from what was to be seen, at an early day, on Goat Island, adjoining the Falls of Niagara. A multitude of goats ran at large there, the descendants of a few reared originally by one Stedman, an English soldier, who, on escaping a massacre of his comrades in the neighbourhood of what is now Lewiston, at the hands of the Iroquois, soon after the conquest of the country, fled " thither, and led, to the end of his days, a Robinson-Crusoe-kind of life. V. KING STREET, FROM JOHN STREET TO YONGE STREET. 'FTER our long stroll westward, we had purposed returning to the place of beginning by the route which constitutes the principal thoroughfare of the modem Toronto ; but the associations connected with the primitive pathway on the cliff overlooking the harbour, led us insensibly back along the track by which we came. In order that we may execute our original design, we now transport ourselves at once to the point where we had intended to begin our descent of King Street. That point was the site of a building now wholly taken out of the way — the old General Hos- pital. Farther west on this line of road there was no object pos- sessing any archaeological interest. The old Hospital was a spacious, unadorned, matter-of-fact, two-storey structure, of red brick, one hundred and seven feet long, and sixty-six feet wide. It had, by the direction of Dr. Grant Powell, as we have heard, the peculiarity of standing with its sides precisely east and west, north and south. At a subsequent period, it consequently had the appearance of having being jerked round bodily, the streets in the neighbourhood not being laid out with the same precise regard to the cardinal points. The building exhibited recessed galleries on the north and south sides, and a flattish hipped roof The interior was conveniently designed. In the fever wards here, during the terrible season of 1847, frightful scenes of suffering and death were witnessed among the newly-arrived emigrants ; here it was that, in ministering to them in their distress, so many were struck down, some all but fatally, § 5-] King Street, from John to Yonge Streets. 89 others wholly so ; amongst the latter several leading medical men, and the Roman Catholic Bishop, Power. When the Houses of Parliament, at the east end of the town, were destroyed by fire in 1824, the Legislature assembled for seve- ral sessions in the General Hospital. The neighbourhood hereabout had an open, unoccupied look in 1822. In a Weekly Register of the 2 5 th of April of that year, we have an account of the presentation of a set of colours to a militia bat- talion, mustered for the purpose on the road near the Hospital. "Tuesday, the 23rd instant," the Register reports, "being the anniversary of St. George, on which it has been appointed to cele- brate His Majesty's birthday, George IV., [instead of the 4th of June, the f6te of the late King,] the East and West Regiments, with Capt. Button's Troop of Cavalry, which are attached to the North York Regiment, on the right, were formed in line at eleven o'clock in the forenoon, on the road in front of the Government House, and a Guard of Honour, consisting of 100 rank and file from each regiment, with officers and sergeants in proportion, under the command of Lieut.-Col. FitzGibbon, were formed at a short distance in front of the centre, as the representatives of the militia of the Province, in order to receive the rich and beautiful Colours which His Majesty has been graciously pleased to com- mand should be prepared for the late incorporated Battalion, as an honourable testimony of the high sense which His Majesty has been pleased to entertain of the zeal and gallantry of the militia of Upper Canada." The Register •Cci.&rs. proceeds: "At 12 o'clock, a Royal Salute was fired from the Garrison, and the Lieutenant-Governor with his staff having arrived on the ground, proceeded to review the widely- extended line ; after which, taking his station in front of the whole, the band struck up the nation anthem of ' God save the King.' His Excellency then dismounted, and accompanied by his staff, on foot, approached the Guard of Honour, so near as to be dis- tinctly heard by the men ; when, uncovering himself, and taking one of the Colours in his hand, in the most dignified and graceful manner, he presented them to the proper officer, with the following address :— ■" Soldiers ! I have great satisfaction in presenting you, as the representatives of the late incorporated Battalion, with these Colours— a distinguished mark of His Majesty's approbation. They will be to you a proud memorial of the past, and a rallying- go Toronto of Old. [§ 5. point around which you will gather with alacrity and confidence, should your active services be required hereafter by your King and Country.' — His Excellency having remounted, the Guard of Honour marched with band playing and Colours flying, from right to left, in front of the whole line, and then proceeded to lodge their Colours at the Government House." " The day was raw and cold," it is added, " and the ground being very wet and uneven, the men could neither form nor march with that precision they would otherwise have exhibited. We were very much pleased, however, with the soldier-like appearance of the Guard of Honour, and we were particularly struck by the new uniform of the officers of the West York, as being particularly well- adapted for the kind of warfare incident to a thickly-wooded coun- try. Even at a short distance.it would be difficult to distinguish the gray coat or jacket from the bole of a tree. There was a very full attendance on the field ; and it was peculiarly gratifpng to ob- serve so much satisfaction on all sides. The Colours, which are very elegant, are inscribed with the word Niagara, to commemo- rate the services rendered by the Incorporated Battalion on that frontier ; and we doubt not that the proud distinction which at- tends these banners will always serve to excite the most animating recollections, whenever it shall be necessary for them to wave over the heads of our Canadian Heroes, actually formed in battle-array against the invaders of our Country. At 2 o'clock His Excellency held a Levee, and in the evening a splendid Ball at the Govern- ment House concluded the ceremonies and rejoicings of the day." The Lieut-Governor on this occasion was Sir Peregrine Maitland, of whom fully hereafter. The building on King Street known as " Government House" was originally the private residence of Chief Justice Elmsley. For many years after its purchase by the Government it was still styled " Elmsley House." As at Quebec, the correspondence of the Govemor-in-Chief was dated from the " Chsiteau St. Louis," or the " Castle of St. Louis," so here, that of the Lieutenant-Gover- nor of the Western Province was long dated from " Elmsley House.'' Mr. Elmsley was a brother of the celebrated classical critic and editor, Peter Elmsley, of Oxford. We shall have occa- sion frequently to speak of him. On the left, opposite Government House, was a, very broken piece of ground, denominated " Russell Square ;" afterwards, through § 5-] King Street, from John to Yon^e Streets. 91 the instrumentality of Sir John Colborne, converted into a site for an educational Institution. Sir John Colborne, on his arrival in Upper Canada, was fresh from the Governorship of Guernsey, one of the Channel Islands. During his administration there he had revived a decayed Public School, at present known as Elizabeth College. Being of opinion that the new country to which he had been transferred was not ripe for a University on the scale con- templated in a royal Charter which had been procured, he ad- dressed himself to the establishment of an institution which should meet the immediate educational wants of the community. Inasmuch as in the School which resulted — or " Minor College" as it was long popularly called — we have a transcript, more or less close, of the institution which Sir John Colborne had been so re- cently engaged in reviving, we add two or three particulars in regard to the latter, which may have, with some, a certain degree of inter- est, by virtue of the accidental but evident relation existing be- tween the two institutions. From a paper in Brayley's Graphic and Historical Illustrator (1834), we gather that Elizabeth College, Guernsey, was originally called the " School of Queen Elizabeth," as having been founded under Letters Patent from that sovereign in 1563, to be a " Grammar-school in which the youth of the Island {juventus) may be better instructed in good learning and virtue." The temple or church of the suppressed Order of Gray Friars (Friars minors or Cordeliers), with its immediate precincts, was assigned for its "use," together with "eighty quarters of wheat rent," accruing from lands in different parts of the Island, which had been given to the friars for dispensations, masses, obits, &c. By the statutes of 1563 the school was divided into six classes ; and books and exercises were appointed respectively for each, the scholars to be admitted being required " to read perfectly, and to recite an approved catechism of the Christian religion by heart." In all the six classes the Latin and Greek languages were the primary objects of instruction; but the Statutes permitted the master, at his discretion, "to add something of his own;" and even " to concede something for writing, singing, arithmetic, and a little play." For more than two centuries the school proved of little public utility. In 1799 there was one pupil on the establish- ment. In 1816 there were no scholars. From that date to 1824 the number fluctuated from 15 to 29. In 1823, Sir John Colborne appointed a committee to investigate all the circumstances con- 92 Toronto of Old. [§ 5. nected with the school, and to ascertain the best mode of assuring its future permanent efficiency and prosperity, without perverting the intention of the foundress. The end of all this was a new building (figured in Brayley) at a cost of ^14,754 2s. 2,d. ; the foundation-stone being laid by Sir John in 1826. On August the 20th, 1829, the revived institution was publicly opened, with one hundred and twenty pupils. " On that day," we are told, " the BaiUff and Jurats of thfe Island, with General Ross, the Lieutenant- Governor [Sir John Colborne was now in Canada], his staff, and the public authorities, headed by a procession consisting of the Principal, Vice-Principal, and other masters and tutors of the school (together with the scholars), repaired to St. Peter's Church, where prayers were read by the Dean, Dr. Durand, and Te Deum and other anthems were sung. They th'en returned to the College, where, in the spacious Examination Hall, a crowded assembly were ad- dressed respectively by the BaiUff and President-director [Daniel de Lisle Brock, Esq. J, Colonel de Havilland, the Vice-President, and the Rev. G. Proctor, B.D., the new Principal, on the anti- quity, objects, apparent prospects, and future efficiency of the institution." Under the new system the work of education was carried on by a Principal, Vice-Principal, a First and Second Classical Master, a Mathematical Master, a Master and Assistant of the Lower School, a Commercial Master, two French Masters and an Assistant, a Master of Drawing and Surveying, besides extra Masters for the German, Italian, and Spanish languages, and for Music, Dancing, and Fencing. The course of instruction for the day scholars, and those on the foundation, included Divinity, History, Geography, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, French, English, Mathematics, Arithmetic, and Writing, at a charge in the Upper School of £,1 psr quarter ; and in the Lower or Preparatory School, of jQ\ per quarter ; for Drawing and Surveying, 15^-. per quarter. The terms for private scholars (including all College dues and subscriptions for exhibitions and prizes of medals, &c.) varied from £fiQ annually with the Principal, to J^^ufi annually with the First Classical Tea cher. The exhibitions in the revived institution were, first, one of ;^3o per annum for four years, founded by the Governor of Guernsey in 1826, to the best Classical scholar, a native of the Bailiwick, or son of a native; secondly, four for four years, of, at least, ;^2oper annum, founded by subscription in 1826, to the best scholars, § 5- J King Street, from John to Yonge Streets. 93 severally, in Divinity, Classics, Mathematics, and Modern Lan- guages ; thirdly, one for four years, of ;^2o per annum, founded in 1827 by Admiral Sir James Saumarez, to the best Theological and Classical scholar ; fourthly, one of ^20 per annum, for four years, from 1830, to the best Classical scholar, given by Sir John Colborne in 1828. There were also two, from the Lower to the Upper School, of ;^6 per annum, for one year or more, founded by the Directors in 1829. The foregoing details will, as we have said, be of some interest, especially to Canadians who have received from the institution founded by Sir John Colborne in Russell Square an important part of their early training. " Whatever makes the past, the distant and the future predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings." So moralized Dr. Johnson amidst the ruins of lona. On this principle, the points of agreement and difference between the educational type and antitype is this instance, will be acknowledged to be curious. Another link of association between Guernsey and Upper Can- ada exists in the now familiar name " Sarnia," which is the old classical name of Guernsey, given by Sir John Colborne to a town- ship on the St. Clair river, in memory of his former government. Those who desire to trace the career of Upper Canada College ad ovo, will be thankful for the following advertisements. The first is from the Loyalist of May 2, 1829. " Minor College. Sealed ten- ders for erecting a School House and four dwelling-houses will be received on the first Monday of June next. Plans, elevations and specifications may be seen after the 1 2th instant, on application to the Hon. Geo. Markland, from whom further information will be received. Editors throughout the Province are requested to insert this noticeuntil the first Monday in June, and forward their accounts for the same to the office of the Loyalist, York. York, ist May, 1829." The second advertisement is from the Upper Canada Gazette of Dec. 17, 1829. "Upper Canada College, established at York. Visitor, the Lieutenant-Governor for the time being. This Col- lege will open after the approaching Christmas Vacation, on Mon- day the 8th of January, 1830, under the conduct of the Masters appointed at Oxford by the Vice Chancellor and other electors, in July last. Principal, the Rev, J. H. Harris, D.D., late Fellow of Clare Hall, Cambridge. Classical Department ; Vice Principal, 94 Toronto of Old. [§ 5. The Rev. T. Phillips, D,D., of Queen's College, Cambridge. First Classical Master : The Rev. Charles Mathews. M.A., of Pembroke Hall, Cambridge. Second Classical Master : The Rev. W. Boul- ton, B.A., of Queen's College, Oxford. Mathematical Depart- ment : The Rev. Charles Dade, M.A., Fellow of Caius College, Cambridge, and late Mathematical Master at Elizabeth College. French, Mr. J. P. De la Haye. English, Writing and Arithmetic, Mr. G. A. Barber and Mr. J. Padfield. Drawing Master, Mr. Drury. (Then follow terms, &c.) Signed : G. H. Markland, Secretary to the Board of Education. York, Upper Canada, Dec. 2, 1829." After Russell Square on the left, came an undulating green field; near the middle of it was a barn of rural aspect, cased-in with up- right, unplaned boards. The field was at one time a kind of Campus Martins for a troop of amateur cavalry, who were in- structed in their evolutions and in the use of the broadsword, by a veteran, Capt. Midford, the Goodwin of the day, at York. Nothing of note presented itself until after we arrived at the roadway which is now known as Bay Street, with the exception, perhaps, of two small rectangular edifices of red brick with bright tin roofs, dropped, as it were, one at the south-west, the other at the north-west, angle of the intersection of King and York Streets. The former was the office of the Manager of the Clergy Reserve Lands ; the latter, that of the Provincial Secretary and Registrar. They are noticeable simply as being specimens, in solid material, of a kind of minute cottage that for a certain p,eriod was in fashion in York and its neighbourhood ; little square boxes, one storey in height, and without basement ; looking as if, by the aid of a ring at theapex of the four sided roof, they might, with no great diffi- culty, be lifted up, like the hutch provided for Gulliver by his nurse Glumdalclitch, and carried bodily away. As we pass eastward of Bay Street, the memory comes back of Franco Rossi, the earliest sciehtific confectioner of York, who had on the south side, near here, a depot, ever fragrant and ambrosial. In his specialities he was a superior workman. From him were procured the fashionable bridecakes of the day ; as also the noyeau, parf ait-amour, and other liqueurs, set out for visitors on New Year's Day. Rossi was the first to import hither good objects of art : fine copies of the Laocoon, the Apollo Belvidere, the Perseus of Ca- nova, with other classical groups arid figures sculptured in Floren- tine alabaster, were disseminated by him in the community. TDHnNweNsaa "^M FIRST METHODIST CHURCH IN YORK, (TORONTO). § 5-] King Street J from John to Yonge Streets. 95 Rossi is the Italian referred to by the author of " Cyril Thorn- ton" in his " Men and Manners in America," where speaking of York, visited by him in 1832, he says : " In passing through the streets I was rather surprised to observe an affiche intimating that ice-creams were to be had within. The weather being hot, I entered, and found the master of the establishment to be an Italian. I never ate better ice at Grange's" — some fashionable resort in London, we suppose. The outward signs of civilization at York must have been meagre when a chance visitor recorded his sur- prise at finding ice-creams procurable in such a place. Great enthusiasm, we remember, was created, far and near, by certain panes of plate glass with brass divisions between them, which, at a period a little later than Cyril Thornton's (Captain Hamilton's) visit, suddenly ornamented the windows of Mr. Bec- kett's Chemical Laboratory, close by Rossi's. Even Mrs. Jameson, in her book of "Winter Studies and Summer Rambles," referring to the shop fronts of King Street, pronounces, in a naive English watering-place kind of tone, " that of the apothecary" to be " worthy of Regent Street in its appearance." A little farther on, still on the southern side, was the first place of public worship of the Wesleyan Methodists. It was a long, low, wooden building, running north and south, and placed a little way back from the street. Its dimensions in the first instance, as we have been informed by Mr. Fetch, who was engaged in its erec- tion, were 40 by 40 feet. It was then enlarged to 40 by 60 feet. In the gable end towards the street were two doors, one for each sex. Within, the custom obtained of dividing the men from the women ; the former sitting on the right hand of one entering the building ; the latter on the left. This separation of the sexes in places of public worship was an oriental custom, still retained among Jews. It also existed, down to a recent date, in some English Churches. Among articles of inquiry sent down from a Diocesan to churchwardens, we have seen the query : " Do men and women sit together indifferently and promiscuously ? or, as the fashion was of old, do men sit together on one side of the church, and women upon the other ?" In Eng- lish Churches the usage was the opposite of that indicated above : the north side, that is, the left on entering, was the place of the women; and the south, that of the men.) In 1688, we have Sir George Wheler, in his "Account of the •96 Toronto of Old. [§ 5. ■Churches of the Primitive Christians," speaking of this custom, which he says prevails also " in the Greek Church to this day : he adds that it " seems not only very decent, but nowadays, since wickedness so much abounds, highly necessary ; for the general mixture,'' he continues, " of men and women in the Latin Church is notoriously scandalous ; and little less," he says, "is their sitting together in the same pews in our London churches." The Wesleyan chapel in King Street ceased to be used in 1833. It was converted afterwards for a time into a " Theatre Royal." Jordan Street preserves one of the names of Mr. Jordan Post, owner of the whole frontage extending from Bay Street to Yonge Street. The name of his wife is preserved in " Melinda Street," which traverses his lot, or rather block, from east to west, south of King Street. Two of his daughters bore respectively the unusual names of Sophronia and Desdemona. Mr. Post was a tall New- Englander of grave address. He was, moreover, a clockmaker by trade, and always wore spectacles. From the formal cut of his ap- parel and hair, he was, quite erroneously, sometimes supposed to be of the Mennonist or Quaker persuasion. So early as 1802, Mr. Post is advertising in the York paper. In the Oracle of Sept. i8, 1802, he announces a temporary absence from the town. " Jordan Post, watchmaker, requests all those who left watches with him to be repaired, to call at Mr. Beman's and receive them by paying for the repairs. He intends returning to York in a few months. Sept. 11, 1802." In the close of the same year, he puts forth the general notice : "Jordan Post, Clock and Watchmaker, informs the public that he now carries on the above business in all its branches, at the upper end of Duke Street. He has a complete assortment of watch furniture. Clocks and watches repaired on the shortest notice, and most reasonable terms, together with every article in the gold and silver line. N. B. — He will purchase old brass. Dec 11, 1802." Besides the block described above, Mr. Post had acquired other valuable properties in York, as will appear by an advertisement in the Weekly Hegister oi ]3.n. 19, 1826, from which also it will be seen that he at one time contemplated a gift to the town of one hundred feet frontage and two hundred feet of depth, for the pur- pose of a second Public Market. " Town Lots for Sale. To be sold by Auction on the Premises, on Wednesday the first day of February next, Four Town Lots on King Street, west of George I 5-] King Street, from John to Yonge Streets. 97 Street. Also, to be leased at the same time to the highest bidder, for twenty-one years, subject to such conditions as will then be produced. Six Lots on the west side of Yonge Street, and Twenty on Market Street. The Subscriber has reserved a Lot of Ground of One Hundred Feet front, by Two Hundred Feet in the rear, on George Street, for a Market Place, to be given for that purpose. He will likewise lease Ten Lots in front of said intended Market. A plan of the Lots may be seen and further particulars known, by application to the Subscriber. Jordan Post. York, Jan. 4, 1826." VI. KING STREET, FROM YONGE STREET TO CHURCH STREET. ; HERE Yonge Street crosses King Street, forming at the present day an unusually noble carrefour, as the French would say, or rectangular intersection of thoroughfares as we are obliged to word it, there was, for a considerable time, but one solitary house — at the north-east angle ; a longish, one-storey, resj)ectable wooden structure, painted white, with paling in front, and large willow trees : it was the home of Mr. Dennis, formerly super- intendant of the Dock-yard at Kingston. He was one of the United Empire Loyalist refugees, and received a grant of land on the Humber, near the site of the modern village of Weston. His son, Mr. Joseph Dennis, owned and commanded a vessel on Lake Ontario in 1812. When the war with the United States broke out, he and his ship were attached to the Provincial Marine. His ves- sel was captured, and himself made a prisoner of war, in which condition he remained for fifteen months. He afterwards com- manded the Princess Charlotte, an early steamboat on Lake On- tario. To the eastward of Mr. Dennis' house, on the same side, at an early period, was an obscure frame building of the most ordinary kind, whose existence is recorded simply for having been tempo- rarily the District Grammar School, before the erection of the spa- cious building on the Grammar School lot. On the opposite side, still passing on towards the east, was the Jail. This was a squat unpainted wooden building, with hipped roof, concealed from persons passing in the street by a tall cedar I 6.] King Street, from Yonge to Church Streets. 99 stockade, such as those which we see surrounding a Hudson's Bay post or a mihtary wood-yard. At the outer entrance hung a billet of wood suspended by a chain, communicating with a bell within ; and occasionally Mr. Parker, the custodian of the place, was sum- moned, through its instrumentality, by persons not there on legiti- mate business. We have a recollection of a clever youth, an im- mediate descendant of the great commentator on British Law, and afterwards himself distinguished at the Upper Canadian bar, who was severely handled by Mr. Parker's son, on being caught in the act of pulling at this billet, with the secret intention of running away after the exploit. The English Criminal Code, as it was at the beginning of the century, having been introduced with all its enormities, pubUc hangings were frequent at an eatrly period in the new Province. A shocking scene is described as taking place at an execution in front of the old Jail at York. The condemned refuses to mount the scaffold. On this, the moral-suasion efforts of the sheriff amount to the ridiculous, were not the occasion so seriously tragic. In aid of the sheriff, the officiating chaplain steps more than once up the plank set from the cart to the scaffold, to show the facility of the act, and to induce the man to mount in like manner ; the condemned demurs, and openly remarks on the obvious difference in the two cases. At last the noose is adjusted to the neck of the wretched culprit, where he stands. The cart is withdrawn, and a deliberate strangling ensues. In a certain existing account of steps taken in 181 1 to remedy the dilapidated and comfortless condition of the Jail, we get a glimpse of York, commercially and otherwise, at that date. In April, 181 1, the sheriff, Beikie, reports to the magistrates at Quar- ter Sessions " that the sills of the east cells of the Jail of the Home District are completely rotten ; that the ceilings in the debtors' rooms are insufficient; and that he cannot think himself safe, should necessity oblige him to confine any persons in said cells or debtors' rooms." An order is given in May to make the necessary repairs ; but certain spike-nails are wanted of a kind not to be had at the local dealers in hardware. The chairman is consequently directed to " apply to His Excellency the Lieutenant-Governor, that he will be pleased to direct that the spike-nails be furnished from the King's stores, as there are not any of the description required to loo Toronto of Old. [§ 6. be purchased at York." A memorandum follows to the effect that on the communication of this necessity to His Excellency, " the Lieutenant-Governor ordered that the Clerk of the Peace do apply for the spike-nails officially in the name of the Court : which he did," the memorandum adds, " on the 8th of May, 1811, and re- ceived an answer on the day following, that an order had been issued that day for 1500 spike-nails, for the repair of the Home District Jail : the nails," it is subjoined, " were received by car- penter Leach in the month of July following." Again: in December, 181 1, Mr. Sheriff Beikie sets forth to the magistrates in Session, that]!" the prisoners in the cells of the Jail of the Home District suffer much from cold and damp, there being no method of communicating heat from the chimneys, nor any bedsteads to raise the straw from the floors, which lie nearly, if not altogether, on the ground." He accordingly suggests that " a small stove in the lobby of each range of cells, together with some rugs or blankets, will add much to the comfort of the unhappy persons confined." The magistrates authorize the supply of the required necessaries, and the order is marked " instant." (The month, we are to notice, was December.) At a late period, there were placed about the town a set of posts having relation to the f Jail. They were distinguished from the ordinary rough posts, customary then at regular intervals along the sidewalks, by being of turned wood, with spherical tops, the lower part painted a pale blue: the upper, white. These were the "limits" — the certi denique fines — beyond which, a'i^/»z«j for debt were not allowed to extend their walks. Leaving the picketted enclosure of the Prison, we soon arrived at an open piece of ground on the opposite (north) side of the street, — afterwards known as the " Court House Square.'' One of the many rivulets or water-courses that traversed the site of York passed through it, flowing in a deep serpentine ravine, a spot to be remembered by the youth of the day as affording, in the winter, facilities for skating and sliding, and audacious exploits on " lea- ther ice." In this open space, a Jail and Court House of a pre- tentious character, but of poor architectural style, were erected in 1824. The two buildings, which were of two storeys, and exactly alike, were placed side by side, a few yards back from the road. ' Their gables were to the south, in which direction were also the chief entrances. The material was red brick. Pilasters of cut stone § 6.] King Street, from Yonge to Church Streets. loi ran up the principal fronts, and up the exposed or outer sides of each edifice. At these sides, as also on the inner and unomamented sides, were lesser gables, but marked by the portion of the wall that rose in front of them, not to a point, but finishing square in two diminishing stages, and sustaining chimneys. It was intended originally that lanterns should have surmounted and given additional elevation to both buildings, but these were discarded, together with tin as the material of the roofing, with a view to cutting down the cost, and thereby enabling the builder to make the pilasters of cut stone instead of " Roman cement." John Hayden was the contractor. The cost, as reduced, was to be ;^3,8oo for the two edifices. We extract from the Canadian Review for July, 1824, published by H. H. Cunningham, Montreal, an account of the commence- ment of the new buildings : " On Saturday, the 24th instant, [April, 1824,] his Excellency the Lieutenant-Governor, attended by his staff, was met by the Honourable the Members of the Executive Council, the Judges of the Court of King's Bench, and the Gen- tlemen of the Bar, with the Magistrates and principal inhabitants of York, in procession, for the purpose of laying the foundation- stone of the new Jail and Court House about to be erected in this Town.- — A sovereign and half-sovereign of gold, and several coins of silver and copper, of the present reign, together with some news- papers and other memorials of the present day, were deposited in a cavity of the stone, over which a plate of copper, bearing an appropriate inscription, was placed ; and after his Excellency had given the first blow, with a hammer handed to him for the purpose, the ceremony concluded with several hearty cheers from all who were present. — If the question were of any real importance,'' the writer adds, " we might have the curiosity to inquire why the de- posit was made in the south-east, rather than in the north-east cor- ner of the building ? " — a query that indicates, as we suppose, a deviation from orthodox masonic usage. In one of the lithographic views published in 1836 by Mr. J. Young, the Jail and Court House, now spoken of, are shewn. Among the objects inserted to give life to the scene, the artist has placed in the foreground a country waggon with oxen yoked to it, in primitive fashion. — Near the front entrance of the Jail, stood, to the terror of evil-doers, down to modern times, a ponderous spe- cimen of the "parish stocks" of the old country, in good condition. 102 Toronto of Old. [§ 6. After 1825, the open area in front of the Jail and Court House became the " Public Place" of the town. Crowds filled it at elec- tions and other occasions of excitement. We have here witnessed several scenes characteristic of the times in which they occurred. We here once saw a public orator run away with, in the midst of his harangue. This was Mr. Jesse Ketchum, who was making use of a farmer's waggon as his rostrum or platform, when the vehicle was suddenly laid hold of, and wheeled rapidly down King Street, the speaker maintaining his equilibrium in the meanwhile with difficulty. Mr. Ketchum was one of the most benevolent and beneficent of men. We shall have occasion to refer to him here- after. It was on the same occasion, we believe, that we saw Mr. W. L. McKenzie assailed by the missiles which mobs usually adopt. From this spot we had previously seen the same personage, after one of his re-elections, borne aloft in triumph, on a kind of pyramidal car, and wearing round his neck and across his breast a massive gold chain and medal (both made of molten sovereigns), the gift of his admirers and constituents : in the procession, at the same time, was a printing-press, working as it was conveyed along in a low sleigh, and throwing off handbills, which were tossed, right and left, to the accompanying crowd in the street. The existing generation of Canadians, with the lights which they now possess, see pretty clearly, that the agitator just named, and his party, were not, in the abstract, by any means so bad as they seemed : that, in fact, the ideas which they sought to propagate are the only ones practicable in the successful government of modern men. Is there a reader nowadays that sees anything very startling in the enunciation of the following principles ? — " The control of the whole revenue to be in the people's representatives ; the Legisla- tive Council to be elective ; the representation in the House of Assembly to be as equally proportioned to the population as possi- ble ; the Executive Government to incur a real responsibility ; the law of primogeniture to be abolished ; impartiality in the selection of juries to be secured ; the Judiciary to be independent ; the mili- tary to be in strict subordination to the civil authorities ; equal rights to the several members of the community ; every vestige cf Church-and-State union to be done away ; the lands and all the revenues of the country to be under the control of the country ; I 6.] King Street, from Yonge to Church Streets. 103 and education to be widely, carefully and impartially diffused ; to these may be added the choice of our own Governor." These were the poHtical principles sought to be established m the Governments of Canada by the party referred to, as set forth in the terms just given (almost verbatim) in Patrick Swiff s Almanac, a well known popular, annual brochure of Mr. McKenzie's. It ■seems singular now, in the retrospect, that doctrines such as these should have created a ferment. But there is this to be said : it does not appear that there were, at the time, in the ranks of the party in power, any persons of very ■superior intellectual gifts or of a wide range of culture or historical knowledge : so that it was not likely that, on that side, there would be a ready relinquishment of political traditions, of inherited ideas, which their possessors had never dreamt of rationally analyzing, and which they deemed it all but treason to call in question. And moreover it is to be remembered that the chief propagan- dist of the doctrines of reform, although very intelligent and ready of speech, did not himself possess the dignity and repose of char- acter which give weight to the utterances of pubHc men. Hence, with the persons who really stood in need of instruction and en- lightenment, his words had an irritating, rather than a conciliatory and convincing effect. This was a fault which it was not in his power to remedy. For his microscopic vision and restless tempera- ment, while they fitted him to be a very clever local reformer, a very clever local editor, unfitted him for the grand role of a national statesman, or heroic conductor of a revolution. Accordingly, although the principles advocated by him finally obtained the ascendancy, posterity only regards him as the Wilkes, the Cobbett, or the Hunt of his day, in the annals of his adopted •country. In the interval between the outbreak or feint at outbreak in 1838, and 1850, the whole Canadian community made a great advance in general intelligence, and statesmen of a genuine quahty began to appear in our Parliaments. Prior to the period of which we have just been speaking, a name much in the mouths of our early settlers was that of Robert Gour- lay.- What we have to say in respect to him, in our retrospect of the past, will perhaps be in place here. Nothing could be more laudable than Mr. Gourlay's intentions at the outset. He desired to publish a statistical account of Can- ada, with a view to the promotion of emigration. To inform him- I04 Toronto of Old. [§ 6, self of the actual condition of the young colony, he addressed a series of questions to persons of experience and intelligence in every township of Upper Canada. These questions are now lying before us ; they extend to the number of thirty-one. There are none of them that a modern reader would pronounce ill-judged or irrelevant. But here again it is easy to see that personal character and tem- perament marred the usefulness of a clever man. His inordinate self-esteem and pugnaciousness, insufficiently controlled, speedily rendered him offensive, especially in a community constituted as that was in the midst of which he had suddenly lighted ; and drove, naturally and of necessity, his opponents to extreme measures in self-defence, and himself to extreme doctrines byway of retaUation : thus he became overwhelmed with troubles from which the tact of a wiser man would have saved him. But for Gourlay, as the event proved, a latent insanity was an excuse. It is curious to observe that, in 1818, Gourlay, in his heat against the official party, whose headquarters were at York, threat- ened that town with extinction ; at all events, with the obliteration of its name, and the transmutation thereof into that of Toronto- In a letter to the Niagara Spectator, he says : — "The tumult excited stiffens every nerve and redoubles the proofs of necessity for action. If the higher classes are against me, I shall recruit among my brother farmers, seven in eight of whom will support the cause of truth. If one year does not make Little York surrender to us, then we'll batter it for two ; and should it still hold out, we have ammunition for a much longer siege. We shall raise the wind against it from Amherstburgh and Quebec — from Edinburgh, Dub- lin and London. It must be levelled to the very earth, and even its name be forgotten in Toronto." But to return for a moment to Mr. McKenzie. On the steps of the Court House, which we are to suppose ourselves now passing, we once saw him under circumstances that were deeply touching. Sentence of death had been pronounced on a young man once employed in his printing-office. He had been vigorously exerting himself to obtain from the Executive a mitigation of the extreme penalty. The day and even the hour for the execution had arrived ; and no message of reprieve had been transmitted from the Lieu- tenant-Governor. As he came out of the Sheriff's room, after re- ceiving the final announcement that there could be no further § 6.] King Street, from Yonge to Church Streets. 105 delay, the white collars on each side of his face were wet through and through with the tears that were gushing from his eyes and pouring down his cheeks ! He was just realizing the fact that nothing further could be done ; and in a few moments afterwards- the execution actually took place. We approach comparatively late times when we speak of the cavalcade which passed in grand state the spot now under review, when Messrs. Dunn and Buchanan were returned as members for the town. In the pageant on that occasion there was conspicuous- a train of railway carriages, drawn of course, by horse power, with the inscription on the sides of the carriages — " Do you not wish you may get it ?" — the allusion being to the Grand Trunk, which was then only a thing in posse. And still referring to processions associated in our memory with Court House Square, the recollection of another comes up, which once or twice a year used formerly to pass down King Street on a Sunday. The townspeople were familiar enough with the march of the troops of the garrison to and from Church, to the sound of mUitary music, on Sundays. But on the occasions now referred to, the public eye was drawn to a spectacle professedly of an opposite character : — to the procession of the "Children of Peace,'' so-called. These were a local off-shoot of the Society of Friends, the- followers of Mr. David Willson, who had his headquarters at Sharon, in Whitchurch, where he had built a " Temple," a large wooden structure, painted white, and resembling a high-piled house of cards. Periodically he deemed it proper to make a demonstration in town. His disciples and friends, dressed in their best, mounted their waggons and solemnly passed down Yonge Street, and then on through some frequented thoroughfare of York to a place previously announced, where the prophet would preach. His topic was usually " Public Affairs : their Total Depravity." The text of all of Willson's homilies might, in effect, be the following mystic sentence, extracted from the popular periodi- cal, already quoted — Patrick Swift's Almanac : " The backwoods- man, while he lays the axe to the root of the oak in the forests of Canada, should never forget that a base basswood is growing in this his native land, which, if not speedily girdled, will throw its dark shadows over the country, and blast his best exertions. Look up, reader, and you will see the branches — the Robinson branch, the Powell branch, the Jones branch, the Strachan branch, the io6 Toronto of Old. [§ 6. Boulton twig, &c. The farmer toils, the merchant toils, the labourer toils, and the Family Compact reap the fruit of their exertions." (Almanac for 1834.) Into all the points here suggested Mr. Willson would enter with great zest. When waxing warm in his discourse, he would some- times, without interrupting the flow of his words, suddenly throw off his coat and suspend it on a nail or pin in the wall, waving about with freedom, during the residue of his oration, a pair of sturdy arms, arrayed, not indeed in the dainty lawn of a bishop, but in stout, well-bleached American Factory. His address was divided into sections, between which "hymns of his own compos- ing" were sung by a company of females dressed in white, sitting on one side, accompanied by a band of musical instruments on the other. Considerable crowds assembled on these occasions : and once a panic arose as preaching was going on in the public room of Law- rence's hotel: the joists of the floor were "heard to crack; a rush was made to the door, and several leaped out of the windows. — A small brick school-house on Berkeley Street was also a place where Willson sometimes sought to get the ear of the general public. — Captain Bonnycastle, in " Canada as it Was, Is, and May Be," i. 285, thus discourses of David Willson, in a strain somewhat too severe and satirical ; but his words serve to show opinions which widely prevailed at the time he wrote : " At a short distance from Newmarket," the Captain says, " which is about three miles to the right of Yonge Street, near its termination at the Holland Landing, on a river of that name running into 'Lake Simcoe, is a settlement of religious enthusiasts, who have chosen the most fertile part of Upper Canada, the country near and for miles round Newmarket, for the seat of their earthly tabernacle. Here numbers of deluded people have placed them- selves under the temporal and spiritual charge of a high priest, who calls himself David. His real name is David Willso n. The Tem- ple (as the building appropriated to the celebration o f their rites is called,) is served by this man, who affects a primitive dress, and has a train of virgin-ministrants clothed in white. He travels about occasionally to preach at towns and villages, in a waggon, followed by others, covered with white tilt-cloths ; but what his peculiar tenets are beyond that of dancing and singing, and imitating David the King, I really cannot tell, for it is altogether too farcical to last § 6. J King Street, from Yonge to Church Streets. 107 long : but Mr. David seems to understand clearly, as far as the temporal concerns of his infatuated followers go, that the old- fashioned signification of metim and tuum are religiously centered in his own sanctum. It was natural that such a field should pro- duce tares in abundance." The following notice of the ''Children of Peace" occurs in Patrick Swift's Almanac for 1834, penned, probably, with an eye to votes in the neighbourhood of Sharon, or Hope, as the place is here called. " This society," the Almanac reports, " numbers about 280 members in Hope, east of Newmarket. They have also stated places of preaching, at the Old Court House, York, on Yonge Street, and at Markham. Their principal speaker is David Willson, assisted by Murdoch McLeod, Samuel Hughes, and others. Their music, vocal and instrumental, is excellent, and their preach- ers seek no pay from the Governor out of the taxes." On week-days, Willson was often to be seen, like any other in- dustrious yeoman, driving into town his own waggon, loaded with the produce of his farm ; dressed in home-spun, as the " borel folk" of Yonge Street generally were : in the axis of one eye there was a slight divergency. — The expression " Family Compact" occurring above, borrowed firom French and Spanish History, appears also in the General Report of Grievances, in 1835, where this sentence is to be read : " The whole system [of conducting Government with- out a responsible Executive] has so long continued virtually in the same hands, that it is little better than a family compact." p. 43. (In our proposed perambulation of Yonge Street we shall have occa- sion to speak again of David Willson.) After the Court House Square came the large area attached to St. James' Church, to the memories connected with which we shall presently devote some space ; as also to those connected with the region to the north, formerly the play-ground of the District Gram- mar School, and afterwards transformed into March Street and its purlieus. At the corner on the south side of King Street, just opposite the Court House, was the clock-and-watch-repairing establishment of Mr. Charles Clinkenbroomer. To our youthful fancy, the general click and tick usually to be heard in an old-fashioned watchmaker's place of business, was in some sort expressed by the name Clin- kunbroomer. But in old local lists we observe the orthography of this name to have been Klinkenbrunner, which conveys another io8 Toronto of Old. [§ 6. idea. Mr. Clmkenbroomer's father, we believe, was attached to the army of General Wolfe, at the taking of Quebec. In the early annals of York numerous Teutonic names are ob- servable. Among jurymen and others, at an early period, we meet with Nicholas Klinkenbnmner, Gerhard Kuch, John Vanzantee, Barnabas Vanderburgh, Lodowick Weidemann, Francis Freder, Peter Hultz, Jacob Wintersteen, John Shunk, Leonard Klink, and so on. So early as 1795 Liancourt speaks of a migration hither of Ger- man settlers from the other side of the Lake. He says a num- ber of German settlers collected at Hamburg, an agent had brought out to settle on " Captain Williamson's Demesne" in the State of New York. After subsisting for some time there at the expense of Capt. Williamson, (who, it was stated, was really the representative of one of the Pulteneys in England), they decamped in a body to the north side of the Lake, and especially to York and its neighbourhood, at the instigation of one Berczy, and " gained over, if we may beheve common fame," Liancourt says, " by the English ;" gained over, rather, it is likely, by the prospect of acquir- ing freehold property for nothing, instead of holding under a patroon or American feudal lord. Probably it was to the accounts of Capt. Williamson's proceed- ings, given by these refugees, that a message from Gov. Simcoe tO' that gentleman, in 1794, was due. Capt. Williamson, who appears to have acquired a supposed personal interest in a large portion of the State of New York, was opening settlements on the inlets on the south side of Lake Ontario, known as lerondequat and Sodus Bay. " Last year," Liancourt informs us, " General Simcoe, Governor of Upper Canada, who considered the Forts of Niagara and Oswego, ... as English property, together with the banks of Lake Ontario, sent an English officer to the Captain, with an in- junction, not to persist in his design of forming the settlements. To which message, " the Captain," we are then told, " returned a plain and spirited answer, yet nevertheless conducted himself with a prudence conformable to the circumstances. All these difficul- ties, however," it is added, " are now removed by the prospect of the continuance of peace, and still more so by the treaty newly concluded." (Of Mr. Berczy, and the German Settlement proper, we shall discourse at large in our section on Yonge Street.) VII. KING STREET : DIGRESSION SOUTHWARDS AT CHURCH STREET : MARKET LANE. 'CROSS Church Street from Clinkunbroomer's were the wooden buildings already referred to, as having re- mained long in a partially finished state, being the re_ suit of a premature speculation. From this point we are induced to turn aside from our direct route for a few moments, attracted by a street which we see a short distance to the south, namely. Market Lane, or Colborne Street, as the modem phraseology is. In this passage was, in the olden time, the Masonic Hall, a wooden building of two storeys. To the young imagination this edifice seemed to possess considerable dignity, from being sur- mounted by a cupola ; the first structure in York that ever enjoyed such a distinction. This ornamental appendage supported above the western gable, by slender props, (intended in fact for the recep- tion of a bell, which, so far as our recollection extends, was never supplied), would appear insignificant enough now ; but it was the first budding of the architectural ambition of a young town, which leads at length to turrets, pinnacles, spires and domes. A staircase on the outside led to the upper storey of the Masonic Hall. In this place were held the first meetings of the first Mecha- nics' Institute, organized under the auspices of Moses Fish, a builder of York, and other lovers of knowledge of the olden time. Here were attempted the first popular lectures. Here we remember hearing— certainly some forty years ago — Mr. John Fenton read a paper on the manufacture of steel, using diagrams in illustration : I to Toronto of Old. [§ 7. one of them showed the magnified edge of a well-set razor, the ser- rations all sloping in one direction, by which it might be seen, the lecturer remarked, that unless a man, in shaving, imparted to the instrument in his hand a carefully-studied movement, he was likely " to get into a scrape."— The lower part of the Masonic Hall was for a considerable while used as a school, kept successively by Mr. Stewart and Mr. Appleton, and afterwards by Mr. Caldicott. At the corner of Market Lane, on the north side, towards the Market, was Frank's Hotel, an ordinary white frame building. The first theatre of York was extemporized in the ball-room of this house. When fitted up for dramatic purposes, that apartment was approached by a stairway on the outside. Here companies performed, under the management, at one time, of Mr. Archbold; at another, of Mr. Talbot; at another, of Mr. Vaughan. The last-named manager, while professionally at York, lost a son by drowning iu the Bay. We well remember the poig- nant distress of the father at the grave, and that his head was bound round on the occasion with a white bandage or napkin. Mrs. Talbot was a great favourite. She performed the part of Cora in Pizarro, and that of Little Pickle, in a comedy of that name, if our memory serves us. Pizarro, Barbarassa or the Siege of Algiers, Ali Baba or the Forty Thieves, the Lady of the Lake, the Miller and his Men, were among the pieces here represented. The body-guard of the Dey of Algiers, we remember, consisted of two men, who always came in with military precision just after the hero, and placed themselves in a formal manner at fixed distances behind him, like two sentries. They were in fact soldiers from the garrison, we think. All this appeared very effective. The dramatic appliances and accessories at Frank's were of the humblest kind. The dimensions of the stage must have been very limited : the ceiling of the whole room, we know, was low. As for orchestra — in those days, the principal instrumental artist of the town was Mr. Maxwell, who, well-remembered for his quiet man- ner, for the shade over one eye, in which was some defect, and for his homely skill on the violin, was generally to be seen and heard, often alone, but sometimes with an associate or two, here, as at all other entertainments of importance, j public or private. Nevertheless, at that period, to an unsophisticated yet active ima- gination, innocent of acquaintance with more respectable arrange- §7-] King Street : Market Lane. 1 1 1 ments, everything seemed charming ; each scene, as the bell rang and the baize drew up, was invested with a magical glamour, similar in kind, if not equal in degree, to that which, in the days of our grandfathers, ere yet the modern passion for real knowledge had been awakened, fascinated the young Londoner at Drury Lane. And how curiously were the illusions of the mimic splendors sometimes in a moment broken, as if to admonish the inexperi- enced spectator of the facts of real hfe. In the performance of Pizarro, it will be remembered that an attempt is made to bribe a Spanish soldier at his post. He rejects and flings to the ground what is called " a wedge of massive gold :" — we recollect the sowid produced on the boards of the stage in Frank's by the fall of this wedge of massive gold : it instantly betrayed itself by this, as well as by its nimble rebound, to be, of course, a gilded bit of wood. And it is not alone at obscure village performances that such disclosures occur. At an opera in London, where all appearances were elaborately perfect, we recollect the accidental fall r f a goblet which was supposed to be of heavy chased silver, and also filled with wine — a contretemps occasioned by the giddiness of the lad who personated a page : two things were at once clear ; the goblet was not of metal, and nothing liquid was contained within it ■- which recalls a mishap associated in our memory with a visit to the Argentina at Rome some years ago : this was the coming off of a wheel from the chariot of a Roman general, at a critical moment ; the descent on this occasion from the vehicle to the stage was a true step from the sublime to the ridiculous ; for the audience observed the accident, and persisted in their laugh in spite of the heroics which the great commander proceeded to address, in operatic style, to his assembled army. It was in the assembly-room at Frank's, dismantled of its thea- trical furniture, that a celebrated fancy ball was given, on the last day of the year 1827, conjointly by Mr. Gait, Commissioner of the Canada Company, and Lady Mary Wilhs, wife of Mr. Justice WilUs. On that occasion the general interests of the Company were to some extent studied in the ornamentation of the room, its floor being decorated with an immense representation, in chalks or water-colour, of the arras of the association. The supporters of the shield were of colossal dimensions : two Uons, rampant, bear- ing flags turning opposite ways : below, on the riband, in charac- ters proportionably large, was the motto of the Company, " Non 112 Toronto of Old. [§ 7. mutat genus solum." The sides and ceiling of the room, with the passages leading from the front door to it, were covered throughout Tvith branchlets of the hemlock-spruce : nestling in the greenery of this perfect bower were innumerable little coloured lamps, each •containing a floating light. Here, for once, the potent, grave and reverend signiors of York, along with their sons and daughters, indulged in a little insanity. Lady Mary Willis appeared as Mary, Queen of Scots ; the Judge himself, during a part of the evening, was in the costume of a gay old lady, the Countess of Desmond, aged one hundred years ; Miss Willis, the clever amateur equestrienne, was Folly, with cap and bells ; Dr. W. W. Baldwin was a Roman senator ; his two sons William and St. George, were the Dioscuri, " Fratres Helenae, lucida Sidera;" his nephew, Augustus Sullivan, was Puss in Boots; Dr. Grant Powell was Dr. Pangloss ; Mr. Kerr, a real Otchipway ■chief, at the time a member of the Legislature, made a magnificent Kentucky backwoodsman, named and entitled Captain Jedediah Skinner. Mr. Gregg, of the Commissariat, was Othello. The Kentuckian (Kerr), professing to be struck with the many fine points of the Moor, as regarded from his point of view, persisted, throughout the evening, in exhibiting an inclination to purchase — an idea naturally much resented by Othello. Col. Givins, his son Adolphus, Raymond Baby, and others, were Indian chiefs of dif- ferent tribes, who more than once indulged in the war-dance. Mr. Buchanan, son of the British Consul at New York, was Darn- ley ; Mr. Thomson, of the Canada Company's office, was Rizzio ; Mr. G. A. Barber was a wounded sailor recently from Navarino (that untoward event had lately taken place) ; his arm was in a sling ; he had suffered in reality a mutilation of the right hand by an explosion of gunpowder, on the preceding 5th of November. Mr. Gait was only about three years in Canada ^ but this short space of time sufficed to enable him to lay the foundation of the Canada Company wisely and well, as is shewn by its duration and prospe- rity. The feat was not accomplished without some antagonism springing up between himself and the local governmental authori- ties, whom he was inclined to treat rather haughtily. It is a study to observe how frequently, at an early stage of Upper Canadian society, a mutual antipathy manifested itself bet ween visitors from the transatlantic world, tourists and settlers (intending and actual), and the first occupants of such places of § 7-] King Street : Market Lane. 1 13 trust and emolument as then existed. It was a feeling that grew partly out of personal considerations, and partly out of difference of opinion in regard to public policy. A gulf thus began at an early period to open between two sections of the community, which widened painfully for a time in after years ; — a fissure, which, at its first appearance, a little philosophy on both sides would have closed up. Men of intelligence, who had risen to position and acquired all their experience in a remote, diminutive settlement, might have been quite sure that their grasp of great imperial and human ques- tions, when they arose, would be very imperfect ; they might, there- fore, rationally have rejoiced at the accession of new minds and additional light to help them in the day of necessity. And on the other hand, the fresh immigrant or casual visitor, trained to matu. rity amidst the combinations of an old society, and possessing a knowledge of its'past, might have comprehended thoroughly the exact condition of thought and feeling in a community such as that which he was approaching, and so might have regarded its ideas with charity, and spoken of them in a tone conciliatory and deli- cate. On both sides, the maxim Tout comprendre, c 'est tout par- donner would have had a salutary and composing effect, " for," as the author of Realmah well says, " in truth, one would never be angry with anybody, if one understood him or her thoroughly." We regret that we cannot recover two small " paper pellets of the brain," of this period, arising out of the discussions connected with the appointment of an outsider (Mr. Justice Willis) to the Bench of Upper Canada. They would have been illustrative of the times. They were in the shape of two advertisements, one in reply to the other, in a local Paper : one was the elaborate title- page of a pamphlet " shortly to appear," on the existing system of Jurisprudence in Upper Canada ; with the motto " Meliora spe- rans ■" the other was an exact counterpart of the first, only in re- versed terms, and bearing the motto " Deteriora timens." In the early stages of all the colonies it is obviously inevitable that appointments ab extra to public office must occasionally, and even frequently, be made. Local aspirants are thus subject to disappointments ; and men of considerable ability may now and then feel themselves overshadowed, and imagine themselves de- pressed, through the introduction of talent transcending their own. Some manifestations of discontent and impatience may thus always be expected to appear. But in a few years this state of things 1 14 Toronto of Old. [§ 7. comes naturally to an end. In no public exigency is there any longer a necessity to look to external sources for help. A home supply of persons " duly qualified to serve God in Church and State" is legitimately developed, as we see in the United States, among ourselves, and in all the other larger settlements from the British Islands. The d&nouement of the Willis-trouble may be gathered from the following notice in the Gazette of Thursday, July 17th, 1828, now lying before us ; " His Excellency the Lieutenant-Governor has been pleased to appoint, by Commission under the Great Seal, Christopher Alexander Hagerman, Esq., to be a Judge in the Court of King's Bench for this Province, in the room of the Hon. John Walpole Willis, amoved, until the King's pleasure shall be signified." Lady Mary Willis, associated with Mr. Gait in the Fancy Ball just spoken of, was a daughter of the Earl of Strathmore. A trial of a painful nature known as Willis v. Bernard in the annals of the Common Pleas, arising out of circumstances connected with Judge Willis's brief residence in Canada, took place in 1832 before the Chief Justice of England and a special jury, at Westminster, Mr. Sergeant Wilde acting for the plaintiff ; Mr. Sergeant Spankie, Mr. Sergeant Storks and Mr. Thesiger, for the defendant : when a thousand pounds were awarded as damages to the plaintiff. On this occasion Mr. Gait was examined as a witness. Judge Willis was afterwards appointed Chief Justice of Demerara. In the Canadian Literary Magazine for April, 1833, there is a notice of Mr. Gait, with a full-length pen-and-ink portrait, similar to those which used formerly to appear in Eraser. In front of the figure is a bust of Lord Byron ; behind, on a wall, is a Map shewing the Canadian Lakes, with York marked conspicuously. From the accompanying memoir we learn that " Mr. Gait always conducted himself as a man of the strictest probity and honour. He was warm in his friendships, and extremely hospitable in his Log Priory at Guelph, and thoroughly esteemed by those who had an oppor- tunity of mingling with him in close and daily intimacy. He was the first to adopt the plan of opening roads before making a settle- ment, instead of leaving them to be cut, as heretofore, by the settlers themselves— a plan which, under the irregular and patchwork system of settling the country then prevailing, has retarded the improvement of the Province more, perhaps, than any other cause." In his Autobiography Mr. Gait refers to this notice of himself § 7- J King Street : Market Lane. 1 1 5 in the Canadian Literary Magazine, especially in respect to an in- timation given therein that contemporaries at York accused him of playing " Captain Grand" occasionally, and " looking down on the inhabitants of Upper Canada.'' He does not affect to say that it was not so ; he even rather unamiably adds : " The fact is, I never thought about them [/. e., these inhabitants], unless to notice some ludicrous peculiarity of individuals." The same tone is assumed when recording the locally famous entertainment, given by himself and Lady Willis, as above de- scribed. Having received a hint that the colonelcy of a militia regiment might possibly be offered him, he says : " This informa- tion was unequivocally acceptable ; and accordingly," he continues, " I resolved to change my recluseness into something more cordial towards the general inhabitants of York. I therefore directed one of the clerks [the gentleman who figured as Rizzio,] to whom I thought the task might be agreeable, to make arrangements for giving a general Fancy Ball to all my acquaintance, and the princi- pal inhabitants. I could not be troubled," he observes, " with the details myself, but exhorted him to make the invitations as nume- rous as possible.'' In extenuation of his evident moodiness of mind, it is to be ob- served that his quarters at York were very uncomfortable. " The reader is probably acquainted," he says in his Autobiography, "with the manner of living in the American hotels, but without experi- ence he can have no right notion of what in those days (1827,) was the condition of the best tavern in York. It was a mean two- storey house ; the landlord, however, [this was Mr. Frank,] did," he says, " all in his power to mitigate the afflictions with which such a domicile was quaking, to one accustomed to quiet." Such an impression had his unfortunate accommodation at York made on him, that, in another place, when endeavouring to describe Dover, in Kent, as a dull place, we have him venturing to employ such extravagant language as this : " Everybody who has been at Dover knows that it is one of the vilest [hypochondriacal] haunts on the face of the earth, except Little York in Upper Canada." We notice in Leigh Hunt's London Journal for June, 1834, some verses entitled " Friends and Boyhood," written by Mr. Gait, in sickness. They will not sound out of place in a paper of early reminiscences : ii6 Toronto of Old, [§7- " Talk not of years ! 'twas yesterday We chased the hoop together, And for the plover's speckled egg We waded through the heather. ' 'Have we not found that fortune's chase For glory or for treasure, Unlike the rolling circle's race, Was pastime, without pleasure ? "Thegreen is gay where gowans grow, "But seize your glass — another time 'Tis Saturday — oh ! come, We'll think of clouded days — Hark ! hear ye not our mother's voice, I'll give a toast — fill up my friend ! The earth ? — she calls us home. Here's ' Boys and merry plays !' " But Market Lane and its memories detain us too long from; King Street. We now return to the point where Church Street intersects that thoroughfare. VIII. KING street: ST. JAMES' CHURCH. ^ HE first Church of St. James, at York, was a plain structure of wood, placed some yards back from the road. Its gables faced east and west, and its solitary door was at its western end, and was approached from Church Street. Its dimensions were 50 by 40 feet. The sides of the building were pierced by two rows of ordinary windows, four above and four below. Altogether it was, in its outward appearance, simply, asa contemporary American " Geo- graphical View of the Province of Upper Canada," now before us, describes it, a " meeting-house for Episcopalians." The work just referred to, which was written by a Mr. M. Smith, before the war of 1812, thus depicts York : " This village," it says, " is laid out after the form of Philadelphia, the streets crossing each odier at right angles ; though the ground on which it stands is not suitable for building. This at present," the notice" subjoins, " is the seat of Government, and the residence of a number of Eng- lish gentlemen. It contains some fine buildings, though they stand scattering, among which are a Court-house, Council-house, a large brick building, in which the King's store for the place is kept, and a meeting-house for Episcopalians ; one printing and other offices." The reservation of land in which the primitive St. James' Church stood, long remained plentifully covered with the original forest. In a wood-cut from a sketch taken early in the present century, prefixed to the " Annals of the Diocese of Toronto,'' the buUding is represented as being in the midst of a great grove, and stumps of various sizes are visible in the foreground. ii8 Toronto of Old. [§ 8. Up to 1803 the Anglican congregation had assembled for Divine Worship in the Parliament Building ; and prior to the appointment of the Rev. Mr. Stuart, or in his absence, a layman, Mr. Cooper, after- wards the well-known wharfinger, used to read the service. In March, 1799, there was about to be a Day of General Thanksgiving. The mode proposed for its solemn observance at York was announced as follows in the Gazette and Oracle oiM-axch 9 : " Notice is hereby given that Prayers will be read in the North Government Building in this Town, on Tuesday, the 12th instant, being the day appointed for a General Thanksgiving throughout the Province to Almighty God for the late important victories over the enemies of Great Britain. Service to begin half after eleven o'clock." We give a contemporary account of the proceedings at an im- portant meeting of the subscribers to the fund for the erection of the first St. James' Church at York, in 1803. It is from the Oracle and Gazette of January 22, in that year. " At a Meeting of the subscribers to afimd for erecting a Church in the Town of York, holden at the Government Buildings, on Saturday the 8th day of January instant, the Hon. Chief Justice [Elmsley] in the Chair. Resolved unanimously : That each sub- scriber shall pay the amount of his subscription by three instal- ments : the first being one moiety in one month from this day ; the second being a moiety of the residue in two months ; and the remainders in three months : That Mr. William Allan and Mr. Duncan Cameron shall be Treasurers, and shall receive the amount of the said subscriptions ; and that they be jointly and severally answerable for all moneys paid into their hands upon the receipt of either of them : That His Honour the Chief Justice, the Honour- able P. Russell, the Honourable Captain McGill, the Reverend Mr. Stuart, Dr. Macaulay, Mr. Chewett, and the two Treasu- rers, be a Committee of the subscribers, with full power and autho- rity to apply the moneys arising from subscriptions, to the pur- pose contemplated : Provided, nevertheless, that if any material difference of opinion should arise among them, resort shall be had to a meeting of the subscribers to decide. That the Church be built of stone, brick, or framed timber, as the Committee may judge most expedient, due regard being had to the superior advantages of a stone or brick building, if not counterbalanced by the addi- tional expense : That eight hundred pounds of lawful money, be the extent upon which the Committee shall calculate their plan ; § 8.] King Street: St. James' Church. 119 but in the first instance, they shall not expend beyond the sum of six hundred pounds (if the amount of the sums subscribed and paid into the hands of the Treasurers, together with the moneys which may be allowed by the British Government, amount to so much), leaving so much of the work as can most conveniently be dispensed with, to be completed by the remaining two hundred pounds : Provided, however, that the said six hundred pounds be laid out in such manner that Divine Worship can be performed with decency in the Church : That the Committee do request the opinion of Mr. Berczy, respecting the probable expenses which will attend the undertaking, and respecting the materials to be preferred ; due regard being had to the amount of the fund, as aforesaid ; and that after obtaining his opinion, they do advertise their readiness to receive proposals conformable thereto. N.B. The propriety of receiving contributions in labour or materials is suggested to the Committee. A. MacDonell, Secretary to the Meeting." In the Gazette and Oracle of June 4, 1803, D. Cameron and W. Allan are inviting tenders for the supply of certain materials required for " building a Church in this Town." "Advertisement. Wanted. A quantity of Pine Boards and Scantling, Stones and Lime, for building a Church in this Town. Any person inclined to furnish any of these articles will please to give in their proposals at the lowest prices, to the subscribers, to be laid before the Committee. D. Cameron, W. Allan. York, I St June, 1803." It would seem that in July the determination was to build the Church of stone. " On Wednesday last, the 6th instant," says the Oracle and Gazette, July 9th, 1803, " a meeting of the subscribers to the fund for erecting a Church in this Town was held at the Government Buildings, on which occasion it was unanimously resolved : That the said Church should be built of Stone. That one hundred toises of Stone should accordingly be contracted for without delay. That a quantity of two-inch pine plank, not exceeding 6,000 feet, should also be laid in ; and a reasonable quantity of Oak studs, and Oak plank, for the window-frames and sashes. — A future meet- ing we understand," the Oracle adds, " will be held in the course of the season, at which, when the different Estimates and Propo- sals have been examined, and the extent which the fund will reach, has been ascertained, something decisive will be settled." 1 20 Toronto of Old. [§ 8. The idea of building in stone appears to have been subsequently- relinquished ; and a Church-edifice in wood was decided on. We are informed that the Commandant of the Garrison, Col. SheafTe, ordered his men to assist in raising the frame. In 1810, a portion of the church-plot was enclosed, at an expense of £1 5s, for rails, of which five hundred were required for the purpose. At the same time the ground in front of the west-end, where was the entrance, was cleared of stumps, at an expense of jQ^ 15 s. In that year the cost for heating the building, and charges connected with the Holy Communion, amounted to £1 7s. 6d., Halifax currency. In 1813, Dr. Strachan succeeded Dr. Stuart as incumbent of the church; and in 1818 he induced the congregation to effect some alterations in the structure. From an advertisement in an early Gazette of the year 1818, it will be seen that the ecclesiastical ideas in the ascendant when the enlargement of the original building was first discussed, were much more in harmony with ancient English Church usages, than those which finally prevailed when the work was really done. With whomsoever originating, the de- sign at first was to extend the building eastward, not southward ; to have placed the Belfry at the west end, not at the south ; the Pulpit was to have been placed on the north side of the Church ; a South Porch was to have been erected. The advertisement referred to reads as follows : — " Advertisement. Plans and Esti- mates for enlarging and repairing the Church will be received by the subscribers before the 20th of March, on which day a decision will be made, and the Contractor whose proposals shall be ap- proved of, must commence the work as the season will permit. The intention is : ist. To lengthen the Church forty feet towards the east, with a circular end ; thirty of which to form part of the body of the Church, and the remaining ten an Altar, with -a. small vestry-room on the one side, and a Government Pew on the other. 2nd. To remove the Pulpit to tlie north side, and to erect two Galleries, one opposite to it, and another on the west end. 3rd. To alter the Pews to suit the situation of the Pulpit, and to paint and number the same throughout the Church. 4th. To raise a Belfry on the west end, and make a handsome entrance on the south side of the Church, and to paint the whole building on the outside. Thomas Ridout, J. B. Robinson, Churchwardens. William Allan. Feb. 18, 1818." § 8.] King Street : St. James' Church. 1 2 1 The intentions here detailed were not carried into effect. On the north and south sides of the old building additional space was enclosed, which brought the axis of the Church and its roof into a north and south direction. An entrance was opened at the southern end, towards King Street, and over the gable in this direction was built a square tower bearing a circular bell-turret, surmounted by a small tin-covered spire. The whole edifice, as thus enlarged and improved, was painted of a hght blue colour, with the exception of the frames round the windows and doors, and the casings at the angles, imitating blocks of stone, alternately long and short, which were all painted white. The original western door was not closed up. Its use, almost exclusively, was now, on Sundays and other occasions of Divine Worship, to admit the Troops, whose benches extended along by the wall on that side the whole length of the church. — The upper windows on all the four sides were now made circular-headed. On the east side there was a difference. The altar-window of the original building remained, only tranformed into a kind of triplet, the central compartment rising above the other two, and made circular headed. On the north and south of this east window were two tiers of lights, as on the western side. In the bell-turret was a bell of sufficient weight sensibly to jar the whole building at every one of its semi-revolutions. In the interior, a central aisle, or open passage, led from the door to the southern end of the church, where, on the floor, was situated a pew of state for the Lieutenant-Governor : small square pillars at its four comers sustained a flat canopy over it, immedi- ately under the ceiling of the gallery ; and below this distinctive tester or covering, suspended against the wall, were the royal arms, emblazoned on a black tablet of board or canvas. Half-way up the central aisle, on the right side, was an open space, in which were planted the pulpit, reading-desk and clerk's pew, in the old orthodox fashion, rising by gradations one above the other, the whole overshadowed by a rather handsome sound- ing-board, sustained partially by a rod from the roof. Behind this mountainous structure was the altar, lighted copiously by the ori- ginal east window. Two narrow side-aisles, running parallel with the central one, gave access to corresponding rows of pews, each having a numeral painted on its door. Two passages, for the same purpose ran westward from the space in front of the pulpit. To 122 Toronto of Old. [§ 8. the right and left of the Lieutenant-Governor's seat, and filling up (with the exception of two square corner pews) the rest of the nor- thern end of the church, were two oblong pews ; the one on the west appropriated to the officers of the garrison ; the other, on the east, to the members of the Legislature. Round the north, west, and south sides of the interior, ran a gallery, divided, like the area below, into pews. This structure was sustained by a row of pillars' of turned wood, and from it to the roof above rose another row of similar supports. The ceijing over the parts exterior to the gallery was divided into four shallow semi-circular vaults, which met at a central point. The pews every- where were painted of a buff or yellowish hue, with the exception of the rims at the top, which were black. The pulpit and its ap- purtenances were white. The rims just referred to, at the tops of the pews, throughout the whole church, exhibited, at regular inter- vals, small gimlet-holes : in these were inserted annually, at Christ- mas-tide, small sprigs of hemlock-spruce. The interior, when thus dressed, wore a cheerful, refreshing look, in keeping with the festi- val commemorated. Within this interior used to assemble, periodically, the little world of York : occasionally, a goodly proportion of the little world of all Upper Canada. To limit ourselves to our own recollections : here, with great regularity, every Sunday, was to be seen, passing to and from the place of honour assigned him, Sir Peregrine Maitland, — a tall, grave officer, always in military undress ; his countenance ever wearing a mingled expression of sadness and benevolence, like that which one may observe on the face of the predecessor of Louis Philippe, Charles the Tenth, whose current portrait recalls, not badly, the whole head and figure of this early Governor of Upper Canada. In an outline representation which we accidentally possessed, of a panorama of the battle of Waterloo, on exhibition in London, the ist Foot Guards were conspicuouly to be seen led on by " Major- General Sir Peregrine Maitland." It was a matter of no small curi- osity to the boyish mind, and something that helped to rouse an interest in history generally, to be assured that the living personage here, every week, before the eye, was the commander represented in the panorama ; one who had actually passed through the tre- mendous excitement of the real scene. With persons of wider knowledge, Sir Peregrine was invested § 8.] King Street : St. James' Church. 123 with further associations. Besides being the royal representative in these parts, he was the son-in-law of Charles Gordon Lennox, fourth Duke of Richmond, a name that stirred chivalrous feelings in early Canadians of both Provinces ; for the Duke had come to Canada as Govemor-in-Chief, with a grand reputation acquired as Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland ; and great benefits were expected, and probably would have been reaUzed from his administration, had it been of long continuance. But he had been suddenly removed by an excruciating death. Whilst on a tour of inspection in the Upper Province, he had been fatally attacked with hydrophobia, occa- sioned by the bite of a pet fox. The injury had been received at Sorel ; its terrible effects were fatally experienced at a place near the Ottawa, since named Richmond. Some of the prestige of the deceased Duke continued to adhere to Sir Peregrine Maitland, for he had married the Duke's daughter, a graceful and elegant woman, who was always at his side, here and at Stamford Cottage across the Lake. She bore a name not unfami- liar in the domestic annals of George the Third, who once, it is said, was enamoured of a beautiful Lady Sarah Lennox, grandmother, as we suppose, or some other near relative, of the Lady Sarah here before us at York. Moreover, conversationalists whispered about (in confidence) something supposed to be unknown to the general public — that the match between Sir Peregrine and Lady Sarah had been effected in spite of the Duke. The report was that there had been an elopement ; and it was naturally supposed that the party of the sterner sex had been the most active agent in the affair. To say the truth, however, in this instance, it was the lady who precipitated matters. The affair occurred at Paris, soon after the Waterloo campaign. The Duke's final determination against Sir Peregrine's proposals having been announced, the daughter sud- denly withdrew from the father's roof, and fled to the lodgings of Sir Peregrine, who instantly retired to other quarters. The upshot of the whole thing, at once romantic and unromantic, included a marriage and a reconciliation ; and eventually a Lieutenant-Gover- norship for the son-in-law under the Governorship-in-Chief of the father, both despatched together to undertake the discharge of vice- regal functions in a distant colony. At the time of his marriage with Lady Sarah Lennox, Sir Peregrine had been for some ten years a widower. On his staff here at York was a son by his first wife, also named Peregrine, a subaltern in the army. 1 24 Toronto of Old. [§ 8. After the death of the Duke of Richmond, Sir Peregrine became administrator, for a time, of the general government of British North America. The movements of the representative of the Crown were attended with some state in those days. Even a pas- Sage across from York to Stamford, or from Stamford to York, was announced by a royal salute at the garrison. Of a visit to Lower Canada in 1824, when, in addition to the usual suite, there were in the party several young Englishmen of distinction, tourists at that early period, on this continent, we have the following notice in the Canadian Review for December of that year. After mentioning the arrival at the Mansion House Hotel in Montreal, the Review proceeds : " In the morning His Excellency breakfasted with Sir Francis Burton, at the Govern- ment House, whom he afterwards accompanied to Quebec in the Swiftsure steamboat. Sir Peregrine is accompanied," the Review reports, " by Lord Arthur Lennox, Mr. Maitland, Colonels Foster, Lightfoot, Coffin and Talbot ; with the Hon. E. G. Stanley [from 1851 to 1869, Earl of Derby], grandson of Earl Derby, M.P. for Stockbridge, John E. Denison, Esq. [subsequently Speaker of the House of Commons], M.P. for Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and James S. Wortley, Esq. [afterwards Lord Wharncliffe], M.P. for Bossiney in Cornwall. The three latter gentlemen," the magazine adds, " are now upon a tour in this country from England ; and we are happy to learn that they have expressed themselves as being highly gratified with all that they have hitherto seen in Canada." It will be of interest to know that the name of Sir Peregrine Maitland is pleasantly preserved by means of Maitland Scholar ships in a Grammar School for natives at Madras ; and by a Mait- land Prize in the University of Cambridge. The circumstances of the institution of these memorials are these as originally announced : "The friends of Lieutenant-General Sir Peregrine Maitland, K.C.B., late Commander inChief of the Forces in South India,being desirous of testifying their respect and esteem for his character and princi- ples, and for his disinterested zeal in the cause of Christian Truth in the East, have raised a fund for the institution of a prize in one of the Universities, and for the establishment of two native scholar- ships at Bishop Corrie's Grammar School at Madras ; such prize and scholarships to be associated with the name of Sir Peregrine Maitland. In pursuance of the foregoing scheme, the sum of j^ijooo has been given to the University of Cambridge for the § 8.] King Street: St. James' Church. 125 purpose of instituting a prize to be called " Sir Peregrine Mait- land's Prize," for an English essay on some subject connected with the propagation of the Gospel, through missionary exertions in India and other parts of the heathen world." This Prize, which is kept up by the interest accruing every three years, has been awarded at Cambridge regularly since 1845. The successor to Sir Peregrine Maitland in the Government of Upper Canada was another distinguished military officer. Sir John Colborne. With ourselves, the first impression of his form and figure is especially associated with the interior in which we are supposing the reader to be now standing. We remember his first passing up the central aisle of St. James's Church. He had arrived early, in an unostentatious way ; and on coming within the build- ing he quietly inquired of the first person whom he saw, sitting in a seat near the door : Which was the Governor's pew ? The gen- tleman addressed happened to be Mr. Bernard Turquand, who, quickly recognizing the inquirer, stood up and extended his right arm and open hand in the direction of the canopied pew over which was suspended the tablet bearing the Royal Arms. Sir John, and some of his family after him, then passed on to the place indicated. At school, in an edition of Goldsmith then in use, the name of " Major Colborne" in connection with the account of Sir John Moore's death at Corunna had already been observed ; and it was with us lads a matter of intense interest to learn that the new Gov- ernor was the same person. The scene which was epitomized in the school-book, is given at greater length in Gleig's Lives of Eminent British Military Com- manders. The following are some particulars from Colonel Ander- son's narrative in that work : " I met the General," Colonel Ander- son says, "on the evening of the i6th, bringing in, in a blanket and sashes. He knew me immediately, though it was almost dark, squeezed me by the hand and said ' Anderson, don't leave me.' At intervals he added ' Anderson, you know that I have always wished to die in this way. I hope the people of England will be satisfied. I hope my country will do me justice. You will see my friends as soon as you can. Tell them everything. I have made my will, and have remembered my servants. Colborne has my will and all my papers.' Major Colborne now came into the room. He spoke most kindly to him; and then said to me, 1 26 Toronto of Old. [§ 8. ' Anderson, remember you go to , and tell him it is my request, and that I expect, he will give Major Colborne a lieutenant- colonelcy.' He thanked the surgeons for their trouble. He pressed my hand close to his body, and in a few minutes died without a struggle.'' He had been struck by a" cannon ball. The shot, we are told, had completely crushed his shoulder ; the arm was hanging by a piece of skin, and the ribs over the heart, besides been broken, were literally stripped of flesh. Yet, the narrative adds, " he sat upon the field collected and unrepining, as if no ball had struck him, and as if he were placed where he was for the mere purpose of reposing for a brief space from the fatigue of hard riding." Sir John Colborne himself afterwards at Ciudad Rodrigo came within a hair's-breadth of a similar fate. His right shoulder was shattered by a cannon shot. The escape of the right arm from amputation on the field at the hands of some prompt military surgeon on that occasion, was a marvel. The limb was saved, though greatly disabled. The want of symmetry in Sir John Col- bome's tall and graceful form, permanently occasioned by this injury, was conspicuous to the eye. We happened to be present in the Council Chamber at Quebec, in 1838, at the moment when this noble-looking soldier literally vacated the vice-regal chair, and installed his successor Lord Durham in it, after administering to him the oaths. The exchange was not for the better, in a scenic point of view, although the features of Lord Durham, as his well-known portrait shews, were very fine, suggestive of the poet or artist. Of late years a monument has been erected on Mount Wise at Plymouth, in honour of the illustrious military chief and pre-emi- nently excellent man, whose memory has just been recalled to us. It is a statue of bronze, by Adams, a little larger than hfe ; and the likeness is admirably preserved. (When seen on horseback at parades or reviews soldiers always averred that he greatly resembled "the Duke." Dr. Henry, in " Trifles from my Portfolio" (ii. in.) thus wrote of him in 1833 : " When we first dined at Government House, we were struck by the strong resemblance he bore to the Duke of Wellington ; and there is also," Dr. Henry continues, "a great similarity in mind and disposition, as well as in the linea- ments of the face. In one particular they harmonize perfectly — namely, great simplicity of character, and an utter dislike to shew ostentation.") § 8. J King Street: St. James' Church. 127 On the four sides of the granite pedestal of the statue on Mount Wise, are to be read the following inscriptions : in front : John CoLBORNE, Baron Seaton. Born mdcclxxviii. Died mdccclxiii On the right side : Canada. Ionian Islands. On the left side : Peninsula. Waterloo. On the remaining side : In memory of the distinguished career and stainless character of fleld Marshal Lord Seaton, g.c.b., g.c.m.g., g.c.h. This Monument IS erected by his friends and comrades. Accompanying the family of Sir John Colborne to their place in the Church at York was to be seen every Sunday, for some time, a shy-mannered, black-eyed, Italian-featured Mr. Jeune, tutor to the Governor's sons. This was afterwards the eminent Dr. Jeune, Master of Pembroke College at Oxford, a great promoter of reform in that University, and Bishop of Lincoln. Sir John himself was a man of scholarly tastes ; a great student of history, and a prac- tical modem European linguist. Through a casual circumstance, it is said that full praise was not pubhcly given, at the time, to the regiment commanded by Sir John Colborne, the 5 2nd, for the particular service rendered by it at the battle of Waterloo. By the independent direction of their leader, the 5 2nd made a sudden flank movement at the crisis of the fight and initiated the final discomfiture of which the Guards got the sole praise. At the close of the day, when the Duke of WeUington was rapidly constructing his despatch. Colonel Col- borne was inquired for by ^him, and could not, for the moment, be found. The information, evidently desired, was thus not to be had ; and the document was completed and sent off without a special mention of the 52nd's deed of " derring do.'' During the life-time of the great Duke there was much reticence among the military authorities in regard to the Battle of Waterloo from the fact that the Duke himself did not encourage discussion on the subject. All was well that had ended well, appeared to have been his doctrine. He once checked an incipient dispute in re- gard to the great event of the i8th of June between two friends, in his presence, by the command, half-jocose, half-earnest : " You leave the Battle of Waterloo alone ! " He gave ;£'6o for a private letter written by himself to a friend on the eve of the battle, and was heard to say, as he threw the document into the fire, " What a fool was I, when I wrote that ! " Since the death of the Duke, an officer of the sand, subsequently 128 Toronto of Old. _ [§ 8. in Holy Orders,— the Rev. William Leeke—has devoted two volumes to the history of " the 52nd or Lord Seaton's Regiment ; " in which its movements on the field of Waterloo are fully detailed. And Colonel Chesney in his " Waterloo Lectures ; a Study of the Cam- paign of 1815" has set the great battle in a new light, and has de- molished several English and French traditions in relation to it, bringing out into great prominence the services rendered by Blucher and the Prussians. The Duke's personal sensitiveness to criticism was shewn on another occasion: when Colonel Gurwood suddenly died, he, through the police, took possession of the Colonel's papers, and especially of a Manuscript of Table Talk and other ana, designed for pubhcation, and which, had it not been on the instant ruthlessly destroyed, would have been as interesting probably as Boswell's. On Lord Seaton's departure from Canada, he was successively Lord High Commissioner of the Ionian Islands, and Commander- in-Chief in Ireland. He then retired to his own estate in the West of England, where he had a beautiful seat, in the midst of the calm, rural, inland scenery of Devonshire, not far from Plympton, and on the slope descending southward from the summits of Dartmoor. The name of the house is Beechwood, from the numerous clean, bold, magnificent beech trees that adorn its grounds, and give char- acter to the neighbourhood generally. In the adjoining village of Sparkwell he erected a handsome school-house and church. On his decease at Torquay in 1863 his remains were deposited in the Church at Newton Ferrers, the ancient family burying-place of the Yonges. Mrs. Jameson's words in her " Winter studies and Summer Ram- bles," express briefly but truly, the report which all that remember him, would give, of this distinguished and ever memorable Gover- nor of Canada. " Sir John Colborne," she says incidentally, in the Introduction to the work just named, " whose mind appeared to me cast in the antique mould of chivalrous honour ; and whom I never heard mentioned in either Province but with respect and veneration." Dr. Henry in "Trifles from my Portfolio," once before referred to, uses similar language. " I believe," he says, " there never was a soldier of more perfect moral character than Sir John Colborne — a Bayard without gasconade, as well as sans peur et sans reproche." The title " Seaton," we may add, was taken from the name of an ancient seaport town of Devon, the Moridu- num of the Roman period. IX. KING street: ST. jAMEs' CHURCH — {Continued^ T the southern end of the Church, in which we are sup- posing ourselves to be, opposite the Lieutenant-Gov- ernor's pew, but aloft in the gallery, immediately over the central entrance underneath, was the pew of Chief Justice Powell, a long narrow enclosure, with a high screen at its back to keep off the draughts from the door into the gallery, just behind. The whole of the inside of the pew, together with the screen by which it was backed, was lined with dark green baize or cloth. The Chief's own par- ticular place in the pew was its central point. There, as in a focus, surrounded by the members of his family, he calmly sat, with his face to the north, his white head and intelligent features well brought out by the dark back-ground of the screen behind. The spectator, on looking up and recognizing the presence of the Chief Justice thus seated, involuntarily imagined himself, for the moment, to be in court In truth, in an absent moment, the Judge himself might experience some confusion as to his where- abouts. For below him, on his right and left, he would see many of the barristers, attorneys, jurors and witnesses (to go no farther), who on week days were to be seen or heard before him in different compartments of the Court-room. Chief Justice Powell was of Welsh descent. The name is, of course, Ap Howell j of which " Caer Howell," "Howell's Place," the title given by the Chief Justice to his Park-lot at York, is a relic. His portrait exists in Toronto, in possession of members of his family. He was a man of rather less than the ordinary sta- I 130 Toronto of Old. [§ 9. ture. His features were round in outline, unmarked by the painful lines which usually furrow the modem judicial visage, but wake- fully intelligent. His hair was milky white. The head was in- clined to be bald. We have before us a contemporary brochure of the Chief's, from which we learn his view of the ecclesiastical land question, which for so long a period agitated Canada. After a full historical discussion, he recommends the re-investment of the property in the Crown,. " which," he says, " in its bounty, will apply the proceeds equally for the support of Christianity, without other distinction :" but he comes to this determination reluctantly, and considers the plan to be one of expediency only. We give the, concluding paragraph of his pamphlet, for the sake of its ring — so characteristically that of a by-gone day and generation : " If the wise provision of Mr. Pitt,"^ the writer says, " to preserve the Law of the Union [between Eng- land and Scotland], by preserving the Church of England predom- inant in the Colony, and touching upon her rights to tythes only for her own advantage, and by the same course as the Church itself desiderates in England (the exchange of tythes for the fee simple), must be abandoned to the sudden thought of a youthful specula- tor [/. e., Mr. Wilmot, Secretary for the Colonies, who had intro- duced a bill into the Imperial Parliament for the sale of the Lands to the Canada Company], let the provision of his bill cease, and the tythes to which the Church of England was at that time law- fully entitled be restored; she will enjoy these exclusively even of the Kirk of Scotland : but if all veneration for the wisdom of our Ancestors has ceased, and the time is come to prostrate the Church of England, bind her not up in the same wythe with her bitterest enemy; force her not to an exclusive association with any one of her rivals; leave the tythes abolished; abolish all the legal ex- change for them ; and restore the Reserves to the Crown, which, in its bounty, will apply the proceeds equally for the support of Christianity, without other distinction." In the body of the Church, below, sat another Chief Justice, re- tired from public life, and infirm — Mr. Scott — the immediate pre- decessor of Chief Justice Powell ; a white-haired, venerable form, assisted to his place, a little to the south of the Governor's pew, every Sunday. We have already once before referred to Mr. Scott. And again : another judicial personage was here every week long to be seen, also crowned with the snowy honours of advanced § 9.] King Street : St. James' Church. \ 3 1 age — Mr. Justice Campbell — afterwards, in succession to Chief Justice Powell, Chief Justice Sir William Campbell. His place was on the west side of the central aisle. Sir William Campbell was bom so far back as 1758. He came out from Scotland as a soldier in a Highland regiment, and was taken prisoner at York- town when that place was surrendered by Cornwallis in 1781. In 1783 he settled in Nova Scotia and studied law. After practising as a barrister for nineteen years he was appointed Attorney-Gen- eral for the Island of Cape Breton, from which post, after twelve years, he was promoted to a Judgeship in Upper Canada. This was in 1811. Fourteen years afterwards (in 1825), he became Chief Justice. The funeral of Sir William Campbell, in 1 834, was one of un- usual impressiveness. The Legislature was in session at the time, and attended in a body, with the Bar and the Judges. At the same hour, within the walls of the same Church, St. James', the obsequies of a member of the Lower House took place, namely, of Mr. Roswell Mount, representative of the County of Middlesex, who had chanced to die at York during the session. A funeral oration on the two-fold occasion was pronounced by Archdeacon Strachan. — Dr. Henry, author of " Trifles from my Portfolio," attended Sir William Campbell in his last illness. In the work just named, his case is thus described : " My worthy patient became very weak towards the end of the year," the doctor says, " his nights were restless — his appetite began to fail, and he could only relish tit bits. Medicine was tried fruitlessly, so his doc- tor prescribed snipes. At the point of the sandy peninsula oppo- site the barracks," Dr. Henry continues, " are a number of little pools and marshes, frequented by these delectable little birds; and here I used to cross over in my skiff and pick up the Chief Jus- tice's panacea. On this delicate food the poor old gentleman was supported for a couple of months ; but the frost set in — the snipes flew away, and Sir William died." (ii. 112.) Appended to the account of the funeral ceremonies, in the York Courier of the day, we notice one of those familiar paragraphs which sensational itemists like to construct, and which stimulate the self-complacency of small communities. It is headed LoNGEvrTY, and then thus proceeds : " At the funeral of the late Sir W. Camp- bell, on Monday, there were twenty inhabitants of York, whose united ages exceed fourteen hundred and fifty years !" 132 Toronto of Old. [§ 9. It is certain that there were to be seen moving up the aisles of the old wooden St. James', at York, every Sunday, a striking num- ber of venerable and dignified forms. For one thing their cos- tume helped to render them picturesque and interesting. The person of our immediate ancestors was well set off by their dress. Recall their easy, partially cut-away black coats and upright collars ; their so-called small-clothes and buckled shoes ; the frilled shirt-bosoms and the white cravats, not apologies for cravats, but real envelopes for the neck. (The comfortable, well-to-do Quaker of the old school still exhibits in use some of their homely peculiarities of garb.) And then remember the cut and arrangement of their hair, generally milky white, either from age or by the aid of powder ; their smoothly-shaven cheek and chin ; and the peculiar expression superinduced in the eye and the whole countenance, by the governing ideas of the period, ideas which we are wont to style old-fashioned, but which furnished, nevertheless, for the time being, very useful and definite rules of conduct. Two pictures, one,^Trumbull's Signing of the Declaration of In- dependence ; the other, Huntingdon's Republican Court of Wash- ington (shewn in Paris in 1867), exhibit to the eye the outward and visible presentment of the prominent actors in the affairs of the central portion of the Northern Continent, a century ago. These paintings may help to do the same, in some degree, for us here in the north, also ; any one of the more conspicuous figures in the congregation of the old St. James's, at York, might have step- ped out from the canvas of one or other of the historic works of art just named. On occasions of state, even the silken bag (in the case of officials at least) was attached to the nape of the neck, as though, in accordance with a fashion of an earlier day still, the hair were yet worn long, and required gathering up in a receptacle pro. vided for the purpose. It seems to-day almost like a dream that we have seen in the flesh the honoured patriarchs and founders of our now" great com- munity — " Zorah, Nahor, Haran, Abram, Lot, The youthful world's gray fathers in one knot ;" that our eyes really once beheld the traces on their countenances of their long and varied experiences, of their cares, and processes of thought ; the traces left by the lapse of years, by times, rough and § 9- J King Street: St. James' Church. 133 troublous, not merely heard of by the hearing of the ear, as exist- ing across the Lakes or across the Seas, but encountered in their own persons, in their own land, at their own hearths ; encountered and bravely struggled through ; — that we were eye-witnesses of their cheerfulness and good courage after crisis upon crisis had thus passed over them ; eye-witnesses again, too, of their earnest devotedness to the duties of calmer days, discharged ever honestly and well according to the beliefs and knowledge of the period, and without the realization, in many an instance, of the reach and vast- ness of the scheme of things which was being wrought out : — ^that with our own eyes we saw them, again and again, engaged within consecrated walls, in solemn acts which expressed, in spite of the vicissitudes which their destiny had brought with it, their unaffected faith in the unseen, and their Uving hope in relation to futurity. All this, we say, now seems like a dream of the night, or a mystic revelation of the scenes of a very distant period and in a very dist- ant locality, rather than the recollections of a few short years spent on the spot where these pages are indited. The names, however, which we shall produce will have a sound of reality about them : they will be recognized as familiar, household words still perpetuated, or, at all events, still freshly remembered in the modern Toronto. From amongst the venerable heads and ancestral forms which recur to us, as we gaze down in imagination from the galleries of the old wooden St. James', of York, we will single out, in addition to those already spoken of, that of Mr. Ridout, sometimes Survey- or-General of the Province, father of a numerous progeny, and tribal head, so to speak, of more than one family of connections settled here, bearing the same name. He was a fine typical repre- sentative of the group to which our attention is directed. He was a perfect picture of a cheerful, benevolent-minded Englishman ; of portly form, well advanced in years, his hair snowy-white natur- ally ; his usual costume, of the antique style above described. Then there was Mr. Small, Clerk of the Crown, an EngUshman of similar stamp. We might sketch the rest separately as they rise before the mind's eye ; but we should probably, after all, convey an idea of each that would be too incomplete to be interesting or of much value. We therefore simply name other members of the remarkable group of reverend seniors that assembled habitually in the church at York. Mr. Justice Boulton, Colonel Smith, some- 1 34 Toronto of Old. [§ 9. time President of the Province ; Mr. Allan, Mr. M'Gill, Mr. Crook- shank, Colonel Givins, Major Heward, Colonel Wells, Colonel Fitzgibbon, Mr. Dunn, Dr. Macaulay, Dr. Baldwin, Dr. Lee, Mr. Samuel Ridout, Mr. Chewett, Mr. McNab (Sir Allan's father); Mr. Stephen Jarvis, who retained to the last the ancient fashion of tying the hair in a queue. We might go on with several others, also founders of families that still largely people York and its vicinity ; we might mention old Captain Playter, Captain Denison, Mr. Scarlett, Captain Brooke, sen., and others. FiHal duty would urge us not to omit, in the enumeration, one who, though at a very early period removed by a sudden casualty, is vividly remembered, not only as a good and watchful father, but also as a venerable form har- monizing perfectly in expression and costume with the rest of the group which used to gather in the church at York. Of course, mingled with the ancients of the congregation, there was a due proportion of a younger generation. There was for ex- ample Mr. Simon Washburn, a bulky and prosperous barrister, afterwards Clerk of the Peace, who was the first, perhaps, in these parts, to carry a glass adroitly in the eye. There was Dr. Grant Powell, a handsome reproduction, on a larger scale, of his father the Chief, as his portrait shews ; there were the Messrs. Monro, George and John ; the Messrs. Stanton ; Mr. Billings ; the Messrs. Gamble, John and William ; Mr. J. S. Baldwin, Mr. Lyons, Mr. Beikie, and others, all men of note, distinguishable from each other by individual traits and characteristics that might readily be sketched. And lastly in the interstices of the assemblage was to be seen a plentiful representation of generation number three ; young men and lads of good looks, for the most part, well set-up limbs, and quick faculties ; in some instances, of course, of fractious temper- ament and manners. As ecclesiastical associations are at the mo- ment uppermost, we note an ill habit that prevailed among some of these younglings of the flock, of loitering long about the doors of the church for the purpose of watching the arrivals, and then, when the service was well advanced, the striplings would be seen sporadically coming in, each one imagining, as he passed his fingers through his hair and marched with a shew of manly spirit up the aisle, that he attracted a degree of at- tention ; attracted, perhaps, a glance of admiration from § 9-] King Street : St. James' Church. 135 some of the many pairs of eyes that rained influence from a large pew in the eastern portion of the north gallery, where the numerous school of Miss Purcell and Miss Rose held a command- ing position. It would have been a singular exception to a general law, had the interior into which we are now gazing, and whose habitu6s we are now recalling, not been largely frequented by the feminine portion of society at York. Seated in their places in various direc- tions along the galleries and in the body of the old wooden church, were to be regularly seen specimens of the venerable great- grandmammas of the old English and Scottish type (in one or two instances to be thought of to this day with a degree of awe by rea- son of the vigour, almost masculine, of their character) ; speci- mens of kindly maiden aunts ; specimens of matronly wives and mothers, keeping watch and ward over bevies of comely daughters and nieces. Lady Sarah Maitland herself cannot be called a fixed member of society here, but having been for so long a time a resident, it seems now, in the retrospect, as if she had been really a develop- ment of the place. Her distinguished style, native to herself, had its eflfect on her contemporaries of the gentler sex in these parts. Mrs. Dunn, also, and Mrs. Wells, may likewise be named as spe- cial models of grace and elegance in person and manner. In this all-influential portion of the community, a tone and air that were good prevailed widely from the earliest period. It soon became a practice with the military, and other tempo- rary sojourners attached to the Government, to select partners for life from the families of York. Hence it has happened that, to this day, in England, Ireland and Scotland, and in the Dependencies of the Empire on the other side of the globe, many are the house- holds that rise up and call a daughter of Canada blessed as their maternal head. Local aspirants to the holy estate were thus unhappily, now and then, to their great disgust, baulked of their first choice. But a residue was always left, sufficient" for the supply of the ordinary demand, and manifold were the interlacings of local" connections ; a fact in which there is nothing surprising and nothing to be con- demned : it was from political considerations alone that such affi- nities came afterwards to be referred to, in some quarters, with bitterness. 1 36 Toronto of Old. [§ 9, Occasionally, indeed, a fastidious young man, or a disappointed widower, would make a selection in parts remote from the home circle, quite unnecessarily. We recall especially to mind the sen- sible emotion in the congregation on the first^advent amongst them of a fair bride from Montreal, the then Paris of Canada ; and seve- ral lesser excitements of the same class, on the appearance in their midst of aerial veils and orange blossoms from Lobo, from New York, from distant England. Once the selection of a " helpmeet" from a rival religious communion, in the town of York itself, led to the defection from the flock of a prominent member ; an occur- rence that led also to the publication of two polemical pamphlets, which made a momentary stir ; one of them a declamation by a French bishop ; the other, a review of the same, by the pastor of the abandoned flock. The strictures on the intelligence and moral feeling of the femi- nine, as well as the masculine portion of society at York, delivered by such world-experienced writers as Mrs. Jameson, and such en- lightened critics as were two or three of the later Governors' wives, may have been just in the abstract, to a certain extent, as from the point of view of old communities in England and Germany ; but they were unfair as from the point of view of persons calmly re- viewing all the circumstances of the case. Here again the maxim applies : Tout comprendre, c 'est tout par donner. We have said that the long pew on the west side of the Gover- nor's seat was allotted to the military. In this compartment we remember often scanning with interest the countenance and form of a youthful and delicate-looking ensign, simply because he bore, hereditarily, a name and title all complete, distinguished in the annals of science two centuries ago — the Hon. Robert Boyle : he was one of the aides-de-camp of Sir Peregrine Maitland. Here, also, was to be seen, for a time, a Major Browne, a brother of the formerly popular poetess, Mrs. Hemans. Here, too, sat a Zachary Mudge, another hereditary name complete, distinguished in the scientific annals of Devonshire. He was an officer of Artillery, and one of Sir John Colborne's aides-de-camp ; for some unexplained reason he committed suicide at York, and his remains were depo- sited in the old mihtary burying-ground. In this pew familiar forms were also — Major Powell, Capt. Grubbe, Major Hillier, Capt. Blois, Capt, Phillpotts, brother of the Bishop. The compartment on the east side of the Governor's pew, was as WILLIAM LYON MACKENZIE. §9.] King Street: St. James' Church. 137 we have said, appointedfor the use of the members of the Legislature, when in session. Here at certain periods, generally in mid-winter, were to be observed all the political notabilities of the day ; for at the period we are glancing at, non-conformists as well as conform- ists were to be seen assisting, now and again, at public worship in St. James' Church. In their places here the outward presentments of Col. Nichol (killed by driving over the precipice at Queenston), of Mr. Horner (a Benjamin Franklin style of countenance), of Dr. Lefferty, of Hamnet Pinhey, of Mahlon Burwell, of Absalom Shade, of other owners of old Canadian names, are well remembered. The spare, slender figure of Mr. Speaker Sherwood, afterwards a judge of the King's Bench, was noticeable. Mr. Chisholm, of Oakville, used facetiously to object to the clause in the Litany where " heresy and schism" are deprecated, it so happening that the last term was usually, by a Scotticism, read " Chisholm." Up to the ParUamen- tary pew we have seen Mr. William Lyon McKenzie himself hur- riedly make his way, with an air of great animation, and take his seat, to the visible, but, of course, repressed disconcertment of several honourable members, and others. Altogether, it was a very complete little world, this assemblage within the walls of the old wooden church at York. There were present, so to speak, king, lords, and commons ; gentle and sim- ple in due proportion, with their wives and little ones ; judges, magistrates and gentry ; representatives of governmental depart- ments, with their employes ; legislators, merchants, tradespeople, handicraftsmen ; soldiers and sailors ; a great variety of class and character. All seemed to be in harmony, real or conventional, here ; what- ever feuds, family or political, actually subsisted, no very marked symptoms thereof could be discerned in this place. But the history of all was known, or supposed to be known, to each. The relation- ship of each to each was known, and how it' was brought about. It was known to all how every little scar, every trivial mutilation or disfigurement, which chanced to be visible on the visage or limb of any one, was acquired, in the performance of what boyish freak, in the execution of what practical jest, in the excitement of what con- vivial or other occasion. Here and there sat one who, in obedience to the social code of the day, had been " out," for the satisfaction, as the term was, of 138 Toronto of Old. [§9. himself or another, perhaps a quondam friend — satisfaction ob- tained (let the age be responsible for the terms we use), in more than one instance, at the cost of human life. (Pewholders in St. James' Church from its commencement to about 1 818, were President Russell: Mr.| Justice Cochrane: Mr. Justice Boulton : Solicitor General Gray :JReceiver General Selby : Christopher Robinson : George Crookshank : William Chewett : J. B. Robinson : Alexander Wood : William Willcocks : John Beikie : Alexander Macdonell : Chief Justice Elmsley : Chief Jus- tice Osgoode : Chief Justice Scott : Chief Justice Powell : Attor- ney General Firth : Secretary Jarvis : General]Shaw : Col. Smith : D'Arcy Boulton : William Allan : Duncan Cameron : John Small : Thomas Ridout : William Stanton : Stephen Heward : Donald McLean : Stephen Jarvis : Capt. McGill : Col. Givins : Dr. Mac- caulay : Dr. Gamble : Dr. Baldwin : Dr. Lee : Mr. St. George : Mr. Denison: Mr. Playter: Mr. Brooke: Mr. Cawthra: Mr. Scadding : Mr. Ketchum : Mr. Cooper : Mr. Ross : Mr. Jordan : Mr. Kendrick : Mr. Hunt : Mr. Higgins : Mr. Anderson : Mr. Murchison: Mr. Bright: Mr. O'Keefe: Mr. Caleb Humphrey. — The Churchwardens for 1807-8 were : D'Arcy Boulton and William Allan. For 1809 : William Allan and Thomas Ridout. For 1810: William Allan and Stephen JJarvis. For 1812 : Duncan Cameron and Alexander Legge.) X, KING STREET : ST. jAMEs' CHURCH — {Continued.) ■^^ T is beginning, perhaps, to be thought preposterous that we have not as yet said anything of the occu- pants of the pulpit and desk, in our account of this church interior. We are just about to supply the deficiency. Here was to be seen and heard, at his periodical visits, Charles James Stewart, the second Bishop of Quebec, a man of saintly character and presence ; long a missionary in the Eastern Townships of Lower Canada, before his appointment to the Epis- copate. The contour of his head and countenance, as well as some- thing of his manner even, may be gathered from a remark of the late Dr. Primrose, of Toronto, who, while a stranger, had hap- pened to drop in at the old wooden church when Bishop Stewart was preaching : " I just thought," the doctor said, " it was the old King in the pulpit !" /. e., George III. Here Dr. Okill Stewart, formerly rector of this church, but sub- sequently of St. George's, Kingston, used occasionally, when visiting York, to officiate — a very tall, benevolent, and fine fea- tured ecclesiastic, with a curious delivery, characterized by unex- pected elevations and depressions of the voice irrespective of the matter, accompanied by long closings of the eyes, and then a sud- den re-opening of the same. Whenever this preacher ascended the pulpit, one member of the congregation, Mr. George Duggan, who had had, it was understood, some trivial disagreement with the doctor during his incumbency in former years, was always ex- pected, by on-lookers, to rise and walk out. And this he accord- I40 Toronto of Old. [§10. ingly always did. The movement seemed a regular part of the programme of the day, and never occasioned any sensation. Here the Rev. Joseph Hudson officiated now and then, a mili- tary chaplain, appointed at a comparatively late period to this post ; a clergyman greatly beloved by the people of the town gen- erally, both as a preacher and as a man. He was the first officia- ting minister we ever saw wearing the academical hood over the ordinary vestment. Here, during the sittings of Parliament, of which he was chap- lain, Mr. Addison, of Niagara, was sometimes to be heard. The Library of this scholarly divine of the old school was presented by him en bloc to St. Mark's Church, Niagara, of which he was in- cumbent. It remained for some years at " Lake View," the private residence of Mr. Addison ; but during the incumbency of Dr. McMurray, it has been removed to the rectory-house at Niagara, where it is to continue, in accordance with the first rector's will, for the use of the incumbent for the time being. It is a remarkable collection, as exhibiting the line of reading of a thoughtful and intelligent man of the last century : many treatises and tracts of contemporary, but now defunct interest, not elsewhere to be met with, probably, in Canada, are therein pre- served. The volumes, for the most part, retain their serviceable bindings of old pane-sided calf ; but some of them, unfortunately, bear marks of the havoc made by damp and vermin before their transfer to their present secure place of shelter. Mr. Addison used to walk to and from Church in his canonicals in the old- fashioned way, recalling the Johnsonian period, when clergy very generally wore the cassock and gown in the streets. Another chaplain to the Legislative Assembly was Mr. William Macaulay, a preacher always listened to with a peculiar attention, whenever he was to be heard in the pulpit here. Mr. Macaulay was a member of the Macaulay family settled at Kingston. He had been sent to Oxford, where he pursued his studies without troubling himself about a degree. While there he acquired the friendship of several men afterwards famous, especially of Whately, sometime Archbishop of Dublin, with whom a correspondence was maintained. Mr. Macaulay's striking and always deeply-thoughtful matter was set off to advantage by the fine intellectual contour of his face and head, which were not unUke those to be seen in the portrait § lo.] King Street: St. James' Church. 141 of Maltby, Bishop of Durham, usually prefixed to Morell's The- saurus. One more chaplain of the House may be named, frequently heard and seen in this church — Dr. Thomas Phillips — another divine, well read, of a type that has now disappeared. His per- sonal appearance was very clerical in the old-fashioned sense. His countenance was of the class represented by that of the late Sir Henry EUis, as finely figured, not long since, in the Illustrated News. He was one of the last wearers of hair-powder in these parts. In reading the Creed he always endeavoured to conform to the old English custom of turning towards the east ; but to do this in the desk of the old church was difficult. Dr. Phillips was formerly of Whitchurch, in Herefordshire. He died in 1849, aged 68, at Weston, on the Humber, where he founded and organized the parish of St. Philip. His body was borne to to its last resting-place by old pupils. We once had in our pos- session a pamphlet entitled " The Canadian Remembrancer, a Loyal Sermon, preached on St. George's Day, April 23, 1826, at the Episcopal Church (York), by the Rev. T. Phillips, D.D., Head Master of the Grammar School: Printed at the Gazette Office." There remains to be noticed the " pastor and master " of the whole assemblage customably gathered together in St. James' Church — Dr. John Strachan. On this spot, in successive edifices, each following the other in rapid succession, and each surpassing the other in dignity and propriety of architectural style, he, for more than half a century, was the principal figure. The story of his career is well known, from his departure from Scotland, a poor but spirited youth, in 1799, to his decease in 1867, as first Bishop of Toronto, with its several intermediate stages of -activity and promotion. His outward aspect and form are also familiar, from the numerous portraits of him that are everywhere to be seen. In stature slightly under the medium height, with countenance and head of the type of Milton's in middle age, with- out eloquence, without any extraordinary degree of originality of mind, he held together here a large congregation, consisting of heterogeneous elements, by the strength and moral force of his personal character. Qualities, innate to himself, decisiveness of intellect, firmness, a quick insight into things and men, with a cer- tain fertility of resource, conspired to win for him the position which he filled, and enabled him to retain it with ease ; to sustain. 142 Toronto of Old. [§ 10, with a graceful and unassuming dignity, all the augmentations which naturally accumulated round it, as the community, of which he was so vital a part, grew and widened and rose to a higher and higher level, on the swelling tide of the general civilization of the continent. In all his public ministrations he was to be seen officiating with- out affectation in manner or style. A stickler in ritual would have declared him indifferent to minutiae. He wore the white vesture of his office with an air of negligence, and his doctor's robe with- out any special attention to its artistic adjustment upon his person. A technical precisian in modem popular theology would pronounce him out now and then in his doctrine. What he seemed espec- ially to drive at was not dogmatic accuracy so much as a well- regulated life, in childhood, youth and manhood. The good sense of the matter delivered — and it was never destitute of that quality — was solely relied on for the results to be produced : the topics of modern controversy never came up in his discourse : at the period to which we refer they were in most quarters dormant, their re-awakening deferred until the close of a thirty years' peace, but then destined to set mankind by the ears when now relieved from the turmoil of physical and material war, but roused to great in- tellectual activity. Many a man that dropped in during the time of public worship, inclined from prejudice to be captious, inclined even to be merry over certain national peculiarities of utterance and diction, which to a stranger, for a time, made the matter delivered not easy to be understood, went out with quite a different sentiment in regard to the preacher and his words. Ill the early days of Canada, a man of capacity was called upon, as we have seen in other instances, to play many parts. It re- quired tact to play them all satisfactorily. In the case of Dr. Strachan — the voice that to-day would be heard in the pulpit, offer- ing counsel and advice as to the application of sacred principles to life and conduct, in the presence of all the civil functionaries of the country, from Sir Peregrine Maitland to Mr. Chief Constable Higgins; from Chief Justice Powell to the usher of his court, Mr. Thomas Phipps ; from Mr. Speaker Sherwood or McLean to Peter Shaver, Peter Perry, and the other popular representatives of the Commons in Parliament ; — the voice that to-day would be heard in the desk leading liturgically the devotions of the same mixed § lo.j King street : St. fames' Church 143 multitude — to-morrow was to be heard by portions, large or small, of the same audience, amidst very different surroundings, in other quarters / by some of them, for example, at the Executive Council Board, giving a lucid judgment on a point of governmental policy, or in the Chamber of the Legislative Assembly, delivering a studied oration on a matter touching the interests and well-being of the whole population of the country, or reading an elaborate original report on the same or some cognate question, to be put forth as the judgment of a committee : or elsewhere, the same voice might be heard at a meeting for patriotic purposes ; at the meeting of a Hospital, Educational, or other important secular Trust ; at an emergency meeting, when sudden action was needed on the part of the charitable and benevolent. Without fail, that voice would be heard by a large portion of the juniors of the flock on the following day, amidst the busy commo- tion of School, apportioning tasks, correcting errors, deciding ap- peals, regulating discipline ; at one time formally instructing, at another jocosely chaffing, the sons and nephews of nearly all the well-to-do people, gentle and simple, of York and Upper Canada. To have done all this without awkwardness shews the possession of much prudence and tact. To have had all this go on for some decades without any blame that was intended to be taken in very serious earnest ; nay, winning in the process applause and gratitude on the right hand and on the left — this argues the exis- tence of something very sterling in the man. Nor let us local moderns, whose lot it is to be part and parcel of a society no longer rudimentary, venture to condemn one who while especially appointed to be a conspicuous minister of religion, did not decline the functions, diverse and multiform, which an in- fant society, discerning the qualities inherent in him, and lacking instruments for its uses, summoned him to undertake. Let no modem caviller, we say, do this, unless he is prepared to avow the opinion that to be a minister of religion, a man must, of necessity, be only partially-developed in mind and spirit, incapable, as a matter of course, of offering an opinion of value on subjects of general human interest. The long possession of imchallenged authority within the imme- diate area of his ecclesiastical labours, rendered Dr. Strachan for some time opposed to the projects that began, as the years rolled on, to be mooted for additional churches in the town of York. He 144 Toronto of Old. [§ lo. could not readily be induced to think otherwise than as the Duke of Wellington thought in regard to Reform in the representation, or as ex-Chancellor Eldon thought in regard to greater prompti- tude in Chancery decisions, that there was no positive need of change. " Would you break up the congregation ? " was the sharp re- joinder to the early propounders of schemes for Church-extension in York. But as years passed over, and the imperious pressure of events and circumstances was felt, this reluctance gave way. The beautiful cathedral mother-church, into \yhich, under his own eye, and through his own individual energy, the humble wooden edifice of 1803 at length, by various gradations, developed, forms now a fitting mausoleum for his mortal remains — a stately monument to one who was here in his day the human main-spring of so many vitally-important and far-reaching movements. Other memorials in his honour have been projected and thought of. One of them we record for its boldness and originality and fitness, although we have no expectation that the aesthetic feeling of the community will soon lead to the practical adoption of the idea thrown out. The suggestion has been this : that in honour of the deceased Bishop, there should be erected, in some public place, in Toronto, an exact copy of Michael Angelo's Moses, to be executed at Rome for the purpose, and shipped hither. The conception of such a form of monument is due to the Rev. W. Macaulay, of Picton. We need not say what dignity would be given to the whole of Toronto by the possession of such a memorial object within its precincts as this, and how great, in all future time, would be the effect, morally and educationally, when the symbolism of the art-object was discovered and understood. Its huge bulk, its boldly-chiselled and only parti- ally-finished limbs and drapery, raised aloft on a plain pedestal of some Laurentian rock, would represent, not ill, the man whom it would commemorate — the character, roughly-outlined and incom- plete in parts, but, when taken as a whole, very impressive and even grand, which looms up before us, whichever way we look, in our local Past. One of the things that ennoble the old cities of continental Eu- rope and give them their own peculiar charm, is the existence of such objects in their streets and squares, at once works of art for the general eye," and memorials of departed worth and greatness. With what interest, for example, does the visitor gaze on the statue ^ lo.] King Street: St. James' Church. 145 ■of Gutenberg at Mayence ; and at Marseilles on that of the good Bishop Belzunce ! — of whom we read, that he was at once "the founder of a college, and a magistrate, almoner, physician and priest to his people." The space in front of the west porch of the ■cathedral of St. James would be an appropriate site for such a noble memorial-object as that which Mr. Macaulay suggests — ^just ^t the spot where was the entrance, the one sole humble portal, of the structure of wood out of which the existing pile has grown. Our notice of the assembly usually to be seen within the walls of the primitive St. James', would not be complete, were we to omit all mention of Mr. John Fenton, who for some time officiated therein as parish clerk. During the palmy days of parish clerks in the British Islands, such functionaries, deemed at the time, locally, .as indispensable as the parish minister himself, were a very pe- culiar class of men. He was a rarity amongst them, who could repeat in a rational tone and manner the responses delegated to him by the congregation. This arose from the circumstance that he was usually an all but illiterate village rustic, or narrow-minded small-townsman, brought into a prominence felt on all sides to be a.wkward. Mr. Fenton's peculiarities, on the contrary, arose from his intel- ligence, his acquirements, and his independence of character. He •was a rather small shrewd-featured person, at a glance not deficient in self-esteem. He was a proficient in modern popular science, a leady talker and lecturer. Being only a proxy, his rendering of the official responses in church was marked perhaps by a little too much individuality, but it could not be said that it was destitute of a certain rhetorical propriety of emphasis and intonation. Though not gifted, in his own person, with much melody of voice, his acquisitions included some knowledge of music. In those days congregational psalmody was at a low ebb, and the small choirs that offered themselves fluctuated, and now and then vanished ■wholly. Not unfrequently, Mr. Fenton, after giving out the por- tion of Brady and Tate, which it pleased him to select, would exe- cute the whole of it as a solo, to some accustomed air, with gracefiil variations of his own. All this would be done with great coolness and apparent self-satisfaction. While the discourse was going on in the Pulpit above him, it was his way, often, to lean himself resignedly back in a comer of his pew and throw a white cambric handkerchief over his head and face. J 146 Toronto of Old. [§ 10, It illustrates the spirit of the day to add, that Mr. Fenton's employ- ment as official mouth-piece to the congregation of the English Church, did not stand in the way of his making himself useful, at. the same time, as a class-leader among the Wesleyan Methodists. The temperament and general style of this gentleman did not fail of course to produce irritation of mind in some quarters. The- Colonial Advocate one morning averred its belief that Mr. Fenton had, on the preceding Sunday, glanced at itself and its patrons in giving out and singing (probably as a solo) the Twelfth Psalm : " Help, Lord, for good and godly men do perish and decay ; and faith and truth from worldly men are parted clean away ; whoso doth with his neighbour talk, his talk is all but vain ; for every- man bethinketh now to flatter, lie and feign ! " Mr. Fenton after- wards removed to the United States, where he obtained Holy Orders in the Episcopal Church. His son was a clever and ingeni- ous youth. We remember a capital model in wood of " Caesar's Bridge over the Rhine," constructed by him from a copper-plate- engraving in an old edition of the Commentaries used by him in the Grammar School at York. The predecessor of Mr. Fenton in the clerk's desk was Mr. Hetherington — a functionary of the old-country village stamp. His habit was, after giving out a psalm, to play the air on a bassoon ; and then to accompany with fantasias on the same instrument such vocalists as felt inclined to take part in the singing. This was the day of small things in respect of ecclesiastical music at York. A choir from time to time had been formed. Once, we have under- stood, two rival choirs were heard on trial in the Church ; one of them strong in instrumental resources, having the aid of a bass- viol, clarionet and bassoon ; the other more dependent on its vocal excellencies. The instrumental choir triumphantly prevailed, as we are assured : and in 1819 an allowance of;^2o was made to Mr. Hetherington for giving instruction in church music. One of the principal encouragers of the vocalist-party was Dr. Burnside. But all expedients for doing what was, in reality, the work of the con- gregation itself were unreliable ; and the clerk or choir-master too often found himself a soliUry performer. Mr. Hetherington's bas- soon, however, may be regarded as the harbinger and foreshadow of the magnificent organ presented in after-times to the congrega- tion of the " Second Temple" of St. James', by Mr. Dunn — a costly and fine-toned instruqient (presided over, for a short time, by the § lo.] King Street: St. Jame^ Church. 147 eminent Dr. Hodges, subsequently of Trinity Church, New York), but destined to be destroyed by fire, together with the whole church, after only two years of existence, in 1839. In the conflagration of 1839 another loss occurred, not so much to be regretted ; we refer to the destruction of a very large triplet window of stained glass over the altar of the church, containing three life-size figures by Mr. Craig, a local " historical and orna- mental painter," not well skilled in the ecclesiastical style. As home-productions, however, these objects were tenderly eyed ; but Mrs. Jameson in her work on Canada cruelly denounced them as being "in a vile tawdry taste." — Conceive, in the presence of these three Craigs, the critical authoress of the " History of Sacred and Legendary art," accustomed, in the sublime cathedrals of Europe, to " See the great windows like the jewell'd gates Of Paradise, burning with harmless fire." Mr. Dunn, named above as donor of an organ to the second St. James', had provided the previous wooden church with Com- munion Plate. In the Loyalist of March i, 1828, we read : "The undersigned acknowledges the receipt of;^ii2 18 5 from the Hon. John Henry Dunn, being the price of a superb set of Com- munion Plate presented by him to St. James' Church at this place. J. B. Macaulay, Church Warden, York, 23rd Feb., 1828." Before leaving St. James' Church and its precincts, it may be well to give some account of the steps taken in 181 8, for the en- largement of the original building. This we are enabled to do, having before us an all but contemporary narrative. It will be seen that great adroitness was employed in making the scheme acceptable, and that pains were shrewdly taken to prevent a bur- densome sense of self-sacrifice on the part of the congregation. At the same .time a pleasant instance of voluntary liberality is re- corded. " A very respectable church was built at York in the Home District, many years ago" — the narrative referred to, in the Christian Recorder for 181 9, p. 214, proceeds to state — " which at that time accommodated the inhabitants ; but for some years past, it has been found too small, and several attempts were made to enlarge and repair it. At length, in April 1818, in a meeting of the whole congregation, it was resolved to enlarge the church, and a committee was appointed to suggest the most expeditious and economical method of doing it. The committee reported that a 148 Toronto of Old. [§ lo- subscription in the way of loan, to be repaid when the seats were sold, was the most promising method. No subscription to be taken under twenty-five pounds, payable in four instalments." " Two gentlemen," the narrative continues, " were selected to carry the subscription paper round ; and in three hours from twelve to thirteen hundred pounds were subscribed. Almost all the re- spectable genriemen gave in loan Fifty Pounds ; and the Hon. Justice Boulton, and George Crookshank, Esq., contributed ;^ioo each, to accomplish so good an object. The church was enlarged, a steeple erected, and the whole building with its galleries, hand- somely finished. In January last (1819)," our authority proceeds to say, " when everything was completed, the pews were sold at a year's credit, and brought more money than the repairs and en- largement cost. Therefore," it is triumphantly added, " the inha- bitants at York erect a very handsome church at a very little ex- pense to themselves, for every one may have his subscription mo- ney returned, or it may go towards payment of a pew ; and, what is more, the persons who subscribed for the first church count the amount of their subscription as part of the price of their new pews. This fair arrangement has been eminently successful ; and gave great satisfaction." The special instance of graceful voluntary liberaUty above referred to is then subjoined in these terms : " George Crookshank, Esq., notwithstanding the greatness of his subscription, and the pains which he took in getting the church well finished, has presented the clergyman with cushions for the pulpit and reading desk, covered with the richest and finest damask ; and likewise cloth for the communion-table. " This pious liberality," the writer remarks, " cannot be too much commended ; it tells us that the benevolent zeal of ancient times is not entirely done away. The congregation were so much pleased," it is further recorded, " that a vote of thanks was unanimously offered to Mr. Crookshank for his munifi- cent present." (The pulpit, sounding-board, and desk had been a gift of Governor Gore to the original church, and had cost the sum of one hundred dollars.) When the necessity arose in 1830 for replacing the church thus enlarged and improved, by an entirely new edifice of more re- spectable dimensions, the same cool, secular ingenuity was again displayed in the scheme proposed ; and it was resolved by the congregation (among other things) " that the pew-holders of the § lo.] King Street: St. J^ antes' Church. 149 present church, if they demanded the same, be credited one-third of the price of the pews that they purchased in the new church, not exceeding in number those which they possessed in the old church ; that no person be entitled to the privilege granted by the last resolution who shall not have paid up the whole purchase money of his pew in the old church ; that the present church re- main as it is, till the new one is finished ; that after the new church is completed, the materials of the present one be sold to the highest bidder, and the proceeds of the same be applied to the liquidation of any debt that may be contracted in erecting the new church, or furnishing the same ; that the upset price of pews in the new church be twenty-five pounds currency ; " and so on. The stone edifice then erected (measuring within about 100 by 7 5 feet), but never completed in so far as related to its tower, was destroyed by fire in 1839. Fire, in truth, may be said to be, sooner or later, the " natural death " of public buildings in our climate, where, for so many months in every year, the mainten- ance within them of a powerful artificial heat is indispensable. Ten years after the re-edification of the St. James' burnt in 1839, its fate was again to be totally destroyed. But now fire was communicated to it from an external source— from a general con- flagration raging at the time in the part of the town lying to the eastward. On this occasion was destroyed in the belfry of the tower, a Public Clock, presented to the inhabitants of Toronto, by Mr. Draper, on his ceasing to be one of their representatives in Parliament. In the later, annals of St. James' Church, the year 1873 is memorable. Several very important details in Mr. Cumberland's noble de- sign for the building had long remained unrealized. The towei and spire were absent : as also the fine porches on the east, west, and south sides, the turrets at the angles, and the pinnacles and finials of the buttresses. Meanwhile the several parts of the structure where these appendages were, in due time, to be added, were left in a condition to shew to the public the mind and inten- tion of the architect. In 1872, by the voluntary munificence of several members of the congregation, a fund for the completion of the edifice in ac- cordance with Mr. Cumberland's plans was initiated, to which generous donations were immediately added; and in 1873 the 150 Toronto of Old. [§ lO- edifice, of whose humble '• protoplasm" in 1803 we have sought, in a precedmg section, to preserve the memory, was finally brought to a state of perfection. By the completion of St. James' Church, a noble aspect has been given to the general view of Toronto. Especially has King Street been enriched, the ranges of buildings on its northern side, as seen from east or west, culminating centrically now in an ele- vated architectural object of striking beauty and grandeur, worthy alike of the comely, cheerful, interesting thoroughfare which it overlooks, and of the era when the finial crowning its apex was at length set in its place. Worthy of special commemorative record are those whose thoughtful liberality originated the fund by means of which St. James' Church was completed. The Dean, the Very Rev. H. J. Grasett, gave the handsome sum of Five thousand dollars. Mr. John Worthington, Four thousand dollars. Mr. C. Gzowski, Two thou- sand dollars. Mr. J. Gillespie, One thousand dollars. Mr. E. H. Rutherford, One thousand dollars. Mr. W. Cawthra, One thou- sand dollars. Mr. Gooderham and Mr. Worts, conjointly, One thousand dollars. Miss Gordon, the daughter of a former ever- generous member of the congregation, the Hon. J. Gordon, One thousand dollars. Sums, in endless variety, from Eight Hun- dred dollars downwards, were in a like good spirit offered on the occasion by other members of the congregation, according to their means. An association of young men connected with the congre- gation undertook and effected the erection of the Southern Porch. Let it be added, likewise, that in 1866, the sum of Fourteen thousand nine hundred and forty-five dollars was expended in the purchase of a peal of bells, and in providing a chamber for its re- ception in the tower — a free gift to the "whole community greatly surpassing in money's worth the sum above named : for have not the chimes, with all old-countrymen at least, within the range of their sound, the effect of an instantaneous translation to the other side of the Atlantic ? Close the eyes, and at once the spirit is far, faraway, hearkening, now in the calm of a summer's evening, now between the fitful wind-gusts of a boisterous winter's mom, to music in exactly the same key, with exactly the same series of cadences, given out from tree-embosomed tower in some ancient market-town or village, famiUar to the listener in every turn and nook, in days bygone. I lo.] King Street: St. fames' Church. 151 And further, let it be added, that in 1870, to do honour to the memory of the then recently deceased Bishop Strachan, the con- gregation of St. James " beautified " the chancel of their church at a cost of Seven thousand five hundred dollars, surrounding the spacious apse with an arcade of finely carved oak, adding seats for the canons, a decanal stall, a bishop's throne, a pulpit and desk, all in the same style and material, elaborately carved, with a hfe-like bust in white marble of the departed prelate, by Fraser of Mon- treal, in a niche constructed for its reception in the western wall of the chancel, with a slab of dark stone below bearing the following inscription in gilded letters : — "near this spot rest the mortal remains of JOHN STRACHAN, FIRST BISHOP OF TORONTO, WHO DEPARTED THIS LIFE NOVEMBER THE 1ST, 1867, IN THE NINETIETH YEAR OF HIS AGE AND THE TWENTY-NINTH OF HIS EPISCOPATE. HIS CONSPICVOVS LABOVRS, FORESIGHT, AND CONSTANCY IN THE SERVICE OF THE CHVRCH AND COMMONWEALTH, AS AN EDVCATOR, AS A MINISTER OF RELIGION, AS A STATESMAN, FORM AN IMPORTANT PORTION OF THE EARLY HISTORY OF WESTERN CANADA. DVRING THIRTY-FIVE YEARS HE WAS RECTOR OF THIS CHVRCH AND PARISH. IN REMEM- BRANCE OF HIM, THE CONGREGATION HAVE BEAVTIFIED THE CHANCEL AND ERECTED THIS MEMORIAL. EASTER, 1870. XI. KING street: digression northward at church street: THE OLD DISTRICT GRAMMAR SCHOOL. ' MMEDIATELY north of the church plot, and sepa-^ rated from it by an allowance for a street, was a large field, almost square, containing six acres. In a plan of the date 1819, and signed " T. Ridout, Surveyor-Gen- eral," this piece of ground is entitled " College Square." (In the same plan the church reservation is marked "Church Square;" and the block to the west, "Square for Court House and Jail." The fact that the Jail was to be erected there accounts for the name " Newgate Street," formerly borne by what is now Adelaide Street. In the early days, when the destined future was but faintly rea- lized, " College Square " was probably expected to become in time, and to continue for ever, an ornamental piece of ground round an educational institution. The situation, in the outskirts of York, would be deemed convenient and airy. For many years this six-acre field was the play-ground of the District Grammar School. Through the middle of it, from north to south, passed a shallow " swale," where water collected after rains ; and where in winter small frozen ponds afforded not bad sliding-places. In this|moist region, numerous crayfish were to be found in summer. Their whereabouts was always indicated by small clay chimneys of a circular form, built by the curious little nipping creatures themselves, over holes for the admission of air. In different places in this large area were remains of huge pine- stumps, underneath the long roots of which it was an amusement to- §11.] Church Street : Old Grammar School. 155 dig and form cellars or imaginary treasure-vaults and powder-maga- zines. About these relics of the forest still grew remains of the ordi- nary vegetation of such situations in the woods ; especially an abun- dance of the sorrel-plant, the taste of which will be remembered, as being quite relishable. In other places were wide depressions showing where large trees had once stood. Here were no bad places, when the whim so was, to lie flat on the back and note the clouds in the blue vault over head ; watch the swallows and house- martins when they came in spring ; and listen to their quiet prat- tle with each other as they darted to and fro ; sights and sounds^ still every yeai', at the proper season, to be seen and heard in the same neighbourhood, yielding to those who have an eye or ear for such matters a pleasure ever new ; sights and sounds to this day annually resulting from the cheery movements and voices of the direct descendants, doubtless, of the identical speci- mens that flitted hither and thither over the play-ground of yore. White clover, with other herbage that commonly appears spon- taneously in clearings, carpeted the whole of the six acres, with the exception of the places worn bare, where favourable spots had been found for the different games of ball in vogue — amongst which, however, cricket was not then in these parts included — ex- cept, perhaps, under a form most infantile and rudimentary. After falls of moist snow in winter, gigantic balls used here to beformed, gathering as they were rolled along, until by reason of their size and weight they could be urged forward no further : and snow cas- tles on a large scale were laboriously built ; destined to be de- fended or captured with immense displays of gallantry. Prepa- ratory to such contest, piles of ammunition would be stored away within these structures. It was prohibited, indeed, in the articles to be observed in operations of attack and defence, to construct missiles of very wet snow ; to dip a missile in melted snow-water prior to use ; to subject a missile after a saturation of this kind, to the action of a night's frost ; to secrete within the substance of a missile any foreign matter ; yet, nevertheless, occasionally such acts were not refrained from ; and wounds and bruises of an extra serious character, inflicted by hands that could not always be iden- tified, caused loud and just complaints. Portions of the solid and extensive walls of the extemporized snow-fortresses were often con- spicuous in the play-ground long after a thaw had removed the wintry look from the rest of the scene. 154 ToroMo of Old. [§ n- The Building into which the usual denizens of the six-acre play- ground were constrained, during certain portions of each day, to withdraw themselves, was situated at a point 114 feet from its western, and 104 from its southern boundary. It was a large frame structure, about fifty-five long, and forty wide; of two storeys; each of a respectable altitude. The gables faced east and west. On each side of the edifice were two rows of ordinary sash win- dows, five above, and five below. At the east end were fourwin- •dows, two above, two below. At the west end were five windows and the entrance-door. The whole exterior of the building was painted of a bluish hue, with the exception of the window and door frames, which were white. Within, on the first floor, after the lobby, was a large square apartment. About three yards from -each of its angles, a plain timber prop or post helped to sustain the ceiling. At about four feet from the floor, each of these quasi- pillars began to be chamfered off" at its four angles. Filling up the south-east comer of the room was a small platform approached on three sides by a couple of steps. This sustained a solitary ■desk about eight feet long, its lower part cased over in front with thin deal boards, so as to shut off from view the nether extremi- ties of whosoever might be sitting at it. On the general level of the floor below, along the whole length •of the southern and northern sides of the chamber, were narrow desks set close against the wall, with benches arranged at their outer side. At right angles to these, and consequently running ■out, on each side into the apartment, stood a series of shorter •desks, with double slopes, and benches placed on either side. Through the whole length of the room from west to east, between the ends of the two sets of cross benches, a wide space remained vacant. Every object and surface within this interior, were of the tawny hue which unpainted pine gradually assumes. Many were the gashes that had furtively been made in the ledges of the desks and on the exterior angles of the benches ; many the ducts cut in the slopes of the desks for spilt ink or other fluid ; many the small cell with sliding Hd, for the incarceration of fly or spider ; many the initials and dates carved here, and on other convenient surfaces, •on the wainscot and the four posts. On the benches and at the desks enumerated and described, on either side, were ordinarily to be seen the figures and groups which usually fill up a school interior, all busily engaged in one or other §11.] Church Street : Uld Grammar School. 155 of the many matters customary in the training and informing the minds of boys. Here, at one time, was to be heard, on every side, the mingled but subdued sound of voices conning or repeat- ing tasks, answering and putting questions ; at another time, the commotion arising out of a transposition of classes, or the break- ing up of the whole assembly into a fresh set of classes ; at another time, a hushed stillness preparatory to some expected allocution, or consequent on some rebuke or admonition. It was manifest, at a glance, that the whole scene was under the spell of a skilled •disciplinarian. Here, again, the presiding genius of the place was Dr. Strachan. From a boy he had been in the successful discharge of the duties of a schoolmaster. At the early age of sixteen we find that he was in charge of a school at Carmyllie, with the grown-up sons of the neighbouring farmers, and of some of the neighbouring clergy, well under control. At that period he was still keeping his terms and attending lectures, during the winter months, at King's Col- lege, Aberdeen. Two years afterwards he obtained a slightly bet- ter appointment of the same kind at Denino, still pursuing his academical studies, gathering, as is evident from his own memor- anda, a considerable knowledge of men and things, and forming friendships that proved life-long. Of his stay at Denino he says, in 1800 : " The two years which I spent at Denino were, perhaps, as happy as any in my life ; much more than any time since." " At Denino," the same early document states, " I learned to think for myself. Dr. Brown [the parish-minister of the place, after- wards professor at Glasgow,] corrected many of my false notions. Thomas Duncan [afterwards a professor at St. Andrew's] taught me to use my reason and to employ the small share of penetration I possess in distinguishing truth from error. I began to extend my thoughts to abstract and general ideas ; and to summon the author to the bar of my reason. I learned to discriminate between hypo- theses and facts, and to separate the ebullitions of fancy from the deductions of reason. It is not to be supposed that I could or can do these things perfectly ; but I began to apply my powers: my skill is still increasing." Then for two years more, and up to the moment of his bold de- termination to make trial of his fortunes in the new world beyond the seas, he is in charge of the parish-school of Kettle. We have before us a list of his school there, March the 22nd, 1798. The 156 Toronto of Old. [§ H- names amount to eighty-two. After each, certain initials are placed denoting disposition and capability, and the direction of any particular talent. Among these names are to be read that of D. Wilkie, afterwards the artist, and that of J. Barclay, afterwards the naval commander here on Lake Erie. We believe that Thomas Campbell, author of the Pleasures of Hope, was also for a time un- der his care. In the history of Dr. Strachan's educational labours in Canada, the school at York presents fewer points of interest than that at Cornwall, which is rendered illustrious by having had enrolled on its books so many names familiar in the annals of Upper Canada. Among the forty-two subscribers to an address accompanying a piece of Plate in 1833, there are Robinsons, and Macaulays, and Mc- Donells, and McLeans, and Joneses, and Stantotis, and Bethunes ; a Jarvis, a Chewett, a Boulton, a Vankoughnet, a Smith of Kings- ton, an Anderson ; with some others now less known. — So illustra- tive is that address of the skill and earnest care of the instructor on the one hand, and of the value set upon his efforts by his scholars, on the other, after the lapse of many years, that we are induced to give here a short extract from it. "Our young minds," the signers of the address in 1833 say, re- ferring to there school-days in Cornwall — " our young minds re- ceived there an impression which has scarcely become fainter from time, of the deep and sincere interest which you took, not only in our advancement in learning and science, but in all that concerned our happiness or could affect our future prospects in life." To which Dr. Strachan replies by saying, among many other excellent things — " It has ever been my conviction that our scholars should be considered for the time our children ; and that as parents we should study their peculiar dispositions, if we really wish to im- prove them ; for if we feel not something of the tender relation of parents towards them, we cannot expect to be successful in their education. It was on this principle I attempted to proceed : strict justice tempered with parental kindness ; and the present joyful meeting evinces its triumph : it treats the sentiments, and feelings of scholars with proper consideration ; and while it gives the heart and affections full freedom to shew themselves in filial gratitude on the one side, and fatherly affection, on the other, it proves that unsparing labour accompanied with continual anxiety for the learner's progress never fails to ensure success and to produce § II.] Church Street: Old Grammar School. 157 a friendship between master and scholar which time can never dissolve." Notwithstanding the greater glory of the school at Cornwall, (of which institution we may say, in passing, there is an engraving in the board-room of the Toronto Mechanics' Institute,) the lists of the school at York always presented a strong array of the old, well-known and even distinguished. Upper Canadian names. This will be seen by a perusal of the following document, which will also give an idea of the variety of matters to which attention was given in the school. The numerous family names which will at •once be recognized, will require no comment. — The intervals be- tween the calling up of each separate class for examination appear to have been very plentifully filled up with recitations and debates. "Order of examination of the Home District Grammar School [at York]. Wednesday, nth August, 1819. First Day. The Latin and Greek Classes. Euclid and Trigonometry. Thursday, 12th August. Second day. To commence at 10 o'clock. Pro- logue, by Robert Baldwin. — Reading Class. — George Strachan, The Excellence of the Bible. Thomas Ridout, The Man of Ross. James McDonell, Liberty and Slavery. St. George Baldwin, The Sword. Wi\\\a.raMcyi\ir[3.y, Soliloguy on Sleep. Arithmetic Class — James Smith, The Sporting Clergyman. William Boulton, jun., The Foefs New Year's Gift. Richard Gates, Ode to Apollo. Orville Cassell, The Rose. Book-keeping. — William Myers, My Mother. T"rancis Heward, My Father. George Dawson, Lapland. — First Grammar Class. — Second Grammar Class. — Debate on the Slave Trade. For the Abolition : Francis Ridout, John Fitzgerald, William Allan, George Boulton, Henry Heward, William Baldwin, John Ridout, John Doyle, James Strachan. Against the Abolition : Abraham Nelles, James BalDy, James Doyle, Charles Heward^ Allan McDonell, James Myers, Charles Ridout, William Boulton, Walker Smith.— First Geography Class.— Second Geography Class. James Dawson, The Boy that told Lies. James Bigelow, The Va- grant. Thomas Glassco, The Parish Workhouse. Edward Glennon, The Apothecary. — Natural History.— Debate by the Young Boys : Sir William Strickland, Charles Heward. Lord Morpeth, John Owens. Lord Hervey, John Ridout. Mr. Plomer, Raymond Baby. Sir William Yonge, John Fitzgerald. Sir William Windham, John Boulton. Mr. Henry Pelham, Henry Heward. Mr. Ber- nard, George Strachan. Mr. Noel, William Baldwin. Mr. Shippen, 158 Toronto of Old. [§ 1 1 James Baby. Sir Robert Walpole, S. Givins and J. Doyle. Mr. Horace Walpole, James Myers. Mr. Pulteney, Charles Baby. — Civil History. — William Boulton, The Patriot. Francis Ridout, The Grave of Sir John Moore. Saltern Givins, Great Britain, John Boulton, Eulogy on Mr. Pitt. Warren Glaus, The Indian Warrior. Charles Heward, The Soldier's Dream. William Boulton, The Heroes of Waterloo. — Catechism. — Debate on the College at Calcutta. Speakers : Mr. Canning, Robert Baldwin. Sir Francis Baring, John Doyle. Mr. Wainwright, Mark Burnham. Mr. Thorn- ton, John Knott. Sir D. Scott, William Boulton. Lord Eldon, Warren Glaus. Sir S. Lawrence, Allan Macaulay. iMrd Hawkes- bury, Abraham Nelles. Lord Bathurst, James McGill Strachan. Sir Thomas Metcalf, Walker Smith. Lord Teignmouth, Horace Ridout. — Religious Questions and Lectures. — James McGill Strachan, Anniversary of the York and Montreal Colleges antici- pated for tst January, 1822. Epilogue, by Horace Ridout. In the prologue pronounced by "Robert Baldwin," the admin- stration of Hastings in India is eulogized : " Her powerful Viceroy, Hastings, leads the way For radiant Truth to gain imperial sway ; The arts and sciences, for ages lost, Roused at his call, revisit Brahma's coast." Sir William Jones is also thus apostrophized, in connection with his "Asiatic Researches " : ",Thy comprehensive genius soon explored The learning vast which former times had stored." The Marquis of Wellesley is alluded to, and the college founded by him at Calcutta : "At his command the splendid structures rise : Around the Brahmins stand in vast surprise. '' The founding of a Seat of Learning in Calcutta suggests the ne- cessity of a similar institution in Canada. A good beginning, it is said, had been here made in the way of lesser institutions : the prologue then proceeds : " Yet much remains for some aspiring son, Whose liberal soul from that, desires' renown, Which gains for Wellesley a lasting crovra ; Some general structures in these wilds to rear. Where every art and science may appear." §11.] Church Street : Old Grammar School. 1 5 9 Sir Peregrine Maitland, who probably was present, is told that he might in this manner immortalize his name : " O Maitland blest ! this proud distinction woos Thy quick acceptance, back'd. by every muse ; Those feelings, too, which joyful fancy knew When learning's gems first opened to thy view, Bid you to thousands smooth the thorny road. Which leads to glorious Science's bright abode. " "The Anniversary of York and Montreal Colleges anticipated " is a kind of Pindaric Ode to Gratitude : especially it is therein set forth that offerings of thankfulness are due to benevolent souls m Britain : " For often there in pensive mood They ponder deeply on the good They may on Canada bestow — And College Halls appear, and streams of learning flow !" The " Epilogue " to the day's performances is a humorous dis- sertation in doggrel verse on United States innovations in the English Language : a pupil of the school is supposed to complain of the conduct of the master : " Between ourselves, and just to speak my mind. In English Grammar, Master's much behind : I speak the honest truth — I hate to dash — He bounds our task by Murray, Lowth and Ashe. I told him once that Abercrombie, moved By genius deep had Murray's plan improved. He frowned upon me, tumipg up his nose. And said the man had ta'en a maddening dose. Once in my theme I put the word progress — He sentenced twenty lines, without redress ; Again for ' measure ' I transcribed ' endeavour ' — And all the live-long day I lost his favour." &c., &c. • At the examination of the District School on August 7th, 181 6, a similar programme was provided. John Claus spoke the prologue on this occasion, and the follow- ing boys had parts assigned them in the proceedings. The names of some of them appear in the account for 1819, just given : John Skeldon, George Skeldon, Henry Mosley, John Doyle, Charies Heward, James Myers, John Ridout, Charies Ridout, John Fitz- Gerald, John Mosley, Saltern Givins, James Sheehan, Henry He- ward, Allan McDonell, William Allan, John Boulton, William i6o Toronto of Old. [§ ii- Myers, James Bigelow, William Baldwin, St. George Baldwin, K. de Koven, John Knott, James Givins, Horace Ridout, Wil- liam Lancaster, James Strachan, David McNab, John Harraway, Robert Baldwin, Henry Nelles, Warren Shaw, David Shaw, Daniel Murray. In 1816, Governor Gore was at the head of affairs. He is ad- vised, in the Prologue spoken by John Glaus, to distinguish him- self by attention to the educational interests of the country : (The collocation of ijames at the end will excite a smile.) — "O think what honour pure shall bless thy name Beyond the fleeting voice of vulgar fame ! When kings and haughty victors cease to raise The secret murmur and the venal praise, Perhaps that name, when Europe's glories fade, Shall often charm this Academic shade, And bards exclaim on rough Ontario's shore , We found a Wellesley and Jones in Gore !" We have ourselves a good personal recollection of the system of the school at York, and of the interest which it succeeded in awakening in the subjects taught. The custom of mutual ques- tioning in classes, under the eye of the master, was well adapted to induce real research, and to impress facts on the mind when discovered. In the higher classes each lad in turn was required to furnish a set of questions to be put by himself to his class-fellows, on a given subject, with the understanding that he should be ready to set the answerer right should he prove wrong. And again : any lad who should be deemed competent was permitted to challenge another, or several others, to read or recite select rhetorical pieces : a memo- randum of the challenge was recorded : and, at the time appointed, the contest came off, the class or the school deciding the supe- riority in each case, subject to the criticism or disallowance of the master. It will be seen from the matters embraced in the programme given above, that the object aimed at was a speedy and real prepara- tion for actual life. The master, in this instance, was disembar- rassed of the traditions which, at the period referred to, often ren- dered the education of a young man a cumbersome, unintelligent and tedious thing. The cirumstances of his own youth had evi- dently led him to free himself from routine. He himself was an 5 II.] Church Street: Old Grammar School. i6i example, in addition to many another Scottish-trained man of emi- nence that might be named, of the early age at which a youth of good parts and sincere, enlightened purpose, may be prepared for the duties of actual life, when not caught in the constrictor-coils of custom, which, under the old English Public-School-system of sixty years since, used sometimes to torture parent and son for such a long series of years. Dr. Strachan's methods of instruction were productive, for others, of the results realized in his own case. His distinguished Corn- . wall pupils, were all, we believe, usefully and successfully engaged in the real work of life in very early manhood. "The time allowed in a new country like this," he said to his pupils at Cornwall in 1807, " is scarcely sufficient to sow the most necessary seed ; very great progress is not therefore to be expected : if the principles are properly engrafted we have done well." In the same address his own mode of proceeding is thus dwelt upon : " In conducting your education, one of my principal objects has always been to fit you for discharging with credit the duties of any office to which you may hereafter be called. To accomplish this, it was necessary for you to be accustomed frequently to de- pend upon, and think for yourselves : accordingly I have always encouraged this disposition, which when preserved within due bounds, is one of the greatest benefits that can possibly be acquired. To enable you to think with advantage, I not only regulated your tasks in such a manner as to exercise your judgment, but extended your views beyond the meagre routine of study usually adopted in schools ; for, in my opinion, several branches of science may be taught with advantage at a much earlier age than is generally sup- posed. We made a mystery of nothing : on the contrary, we entered minutely into every particular, and patiently explained by what progressive steps certain results were obtained. It has ever been my custom, before sending a class to their seats, to ask myself whether they had learned anything ; and I was always exceedingly mortified if I had not the agreeable conviction that they had made some improvement. Let none of you, however, suppose that what you have learned here is sufficient ; on the contrary, you are to re- member that we have laid only the foundation. The superstruc- ture must be laid by yourselves." Here is an account of his method of teaching Arithmetic, taken from the introduction to a little work on the subject, published by K 1 62 Toronto of Old. [§ it- himself in 1809 : "I divide my pupils," he says, " into separate classes, according to their progress. Each class has one or more sums to produce every day, neatly wrought upon their slates : the work is carefully examined ; after which I command every figure to be blotted out, and the sums to be wrought under my eye. The one whom I happen to pitch upon first, gives, with an audible voice, the rules and reasons for every step ; and as he proceeds the rest silendy work along with him, figure for figure, but ready to correct him if he blunder, that they may get his place. As soon as- this one is finished, the work is again blotted out, and another called upon to work the question aloud as before, while the rest again proceed along with him in silence, and so on round the whole class. By this method the principles are fixed in the mind ; and he must be a very dull boy indeed who does not understand every question thoroughly before he leaves it. This method of teaching Arithmetic possesses this important advantage, that it may be pur- sued without interrupting the pupil's progress in any other useful study. The same method of teaching Algebra has been used with equal success. Such a plan is certainly very laborious, but it will be found successful ; and he that is anxious to spare labour ought not to be a public Teacher. When boys remain long enough, it has been my custom to teach them the theory, and give them a number of curious questions in Geography, Natural Philosophy and Astronomy, a specimen of which may be seen in the questions placed before the Appendix." The youths to be dealt with in early Canadian schools were not all of the meek, submissive species. With some of them occasion- ally a sharp regimen was necessary ; and it was adopted without hesitation. On this point, the address just quoted, thus speaks : " One of the greatest advantages you have derived from your edu- cation here, arises from the strictness of our discipline. Those of you who have not already perceived how much your tranquillity de- pends upon the proper regulation of the temper, will soon be made sensible of it as you advance in years. You will find people who have never known what it is to be in habitual subjection to precept and just authority, breaking forth into violence and outrage on the most frivolous occasions. The passions of such persons, when once roused, soon become ungovernable ; and that impatience of restraint, which they have been allowed to indulge, embitters the greatest portion of their lives. Accustomed to despise the barriers §11.] Church Street : Old Grammar School. 163 erected by reason, they rush forward to indulgence, without regard- ing the consequences. Hence arises much of that wretchedness and disorder to be met with in society. Now the discipHne neces- sary to correct the impetuosity of the passions is often found no- where but in well-regulated schools : for though it should be the first care of parents, they are too apt to be blinded by affection, and grant liberties to their children which reason disapproves. That discipline therefore, which you have some- times thought irksome will henceforth present itself in a very differ- ent light. It will appear the teacher of a habit of the greatest consequence in the regulation of your future conduct ; and you will value it as the promoter of that decent and steady command of temper so very essential to happiness, and so useful in our inter- course with mankind." These remarks on discipline will be the more appreciated, when it is recollected that during the time of the early settlements in this country, the sons of even the most respectable families were brought into contact with semi-barbarous characters. A sporting ramble through the woods, a fishing excursion on the waters, could not be undertaken without communications with Indians and half-breeds and bad specimens of the French voyageur. It was from such sources that a certain idea was derived which, as we remember, was in great vogue among the more fractious of the lads at the school at York. The proposition circulated about, whenever anything went counter to their notions, alway was " to run away to the Nof-west." What that process really involved, or where the " Nor'-west" precisely was, were things vaguely realized. A sort of savage " land of Cock- aigne," a region of perfect freedom among the Indians, was imagined ; and to reach it Lakes Huron and Superior were to be traversed. At Cornwall the temptation was in another direction : there, the idea was to escape to the eastward : to reach Montreal or Quebec, and get on board of an ocean-going ship, either a man-of-war or merchantman. The flight of several lads with such intentions was on one occasion intercepted by the unlooked-for appearance of the head-master by the side of the stage-coach as it was just about to start for Montreal in the dusk of the early morning, with the young truants in or upon it. As to the modes of discipline : — In the school at York — for minor indiscretions a variety of remedies prevailed. Now and then 164 Toronto of Old. [§11. a lad would be seen standing at one of the posts above mentioned, with his jacket turned inside out : or he might be seen there in a kneeling posture for a certain number of minutes ; or standing with the arm extended holding a book. An "ally" or apple brought out inopportunely into view, during the hours of work, might entail the exhibition, article by article, slowly and reluctantly, of all the contents of a pocket. Once we remember, the furtive but too audible twang of a jewsharp was followed by its owner's being obliged to mount on the top of a desk and perform there an air on the offending instrument for the benefit of the whole school. Occasionally the censors (senior boys appointed to help in keep- ing order) were sent to cut rods on Mr. McGill's property adjoin- ing the play-ground on the north ; but the dire implements were not often called into requisition : it would only be when some case of unusual obstinacy presented itself, or when some wanton cruelty, or some act or word exhibiting an unmistakable taint of incipient immorality, was proven. Once a year, before the breaking-up at midsummer, a "feast" was allowed in the school-room at York — a kind of pic-nic to* which all that could, contributed in kind — pastry, and other dain- ties, as well as more substantial viands, of which all partook. It was sometimes a rather riotous affair. At the southeast corner of the six-acre play-ground, about half- an-acre had been abstracted, as it were, and enclosed : here a pub- lic school had been built and put in operation : it was known as the Central School, and was what would now be called a Common School, conducted on the " Bell and Lancaster " principle. Large numbers frequented it. Between the lads attending the Central School, and the boys of the Grammar School, difficulties of course arose : and on many occasions feats of arms, accompanied with considerable risk to life and limb, were performed on both sides, with sticks and stones. Youngsters, ambitious of a character of extra daring, had thus an opportunity of distinguishing themselves in the eyes of their less courageous companions. The same would-be heroes had many stories to tell of the perils to which they were exposed in their way to and from school. Those of them who came from the western part of the town, had, according to their own shewing, mortal enemies in the men of Ketchum's tannery, with whom it was necessary occasionally to have an encounter. While those j II.] Chttrch Street: Old Grammar School. 165 fvho lived to the east of the school, narrated, in response, the at- :acks experienced or delivered by themselves, in passing Shaw's or Hugill's brewery. Mr. Spragge, the master of the Central School, had enjoyed the superior advantage of a regular training in England as an instructor of the young. Though not in Holy Orders, his air and costume were those of the dignified clergyman. Of the Central School, the words of Shenstone, spoken of a kindred establishment, be- came, in one point at all events, true to the letter : — "E'en now sagacious foresight points to shew A little bench of bishops here, — And there, a chancellor in embryo, Or bard sublime. " A son of Mr. Spragge's became, in 1870, the Chancellor of Ontario, or Western Canada, after rising with distinction through the several grades of the legal profession, and filling previously also the post of Vice-Chancellor. Mr. John Godfrey Spragge, who attained to this eminence, and his brothers, Joseph and William, were likewise pupils in their maturer years, in the adjoining more imposing Royal Grammar or Home District School. Mr. Spragge's predecessor at the Central School was Mr. Ap- pleton, mentioned in a preceding section ; and Mr. Appleton's assistant for a time, was Mr. John Fenton. Across the road from the play-ground at York, on the south side, eastward of the church-plot, there was a row of dilapidated wooden buildings, inhabited for the most part by a thriftless and noisy set of people. This group of houses was known in the school as " Irish-town ;'' and " to raise Irish-town," meant to direct a snowball or other light missive over the play-ground fence, in that direction. Such act was not unfrequently followed by an invasion of the Field from the insulted quarter. Some wide chinks, estab- lished in one place here between the boards, which ran lengthwise, enabled any one so inclined, to get over the fence readily. We once saw two men, who had quarrelled in one of the buildings of Irish-town, adjourn from over the road to the play-ground, accom- panied by a few approving friends, and there, after stripping to the skin, have a regular fight with fists: after some rounds, a number of men and women interfered and induced the combatants to return to the house whence they had issued forth for the settle- ment of their dispute. 1 66 Toronto of Old. [§ii- The Parliamentary Debates, of which mention has more than once been made in connection with the District School, took place, on ordinary occasions, in the central part of the school-room ; where benches used to be set out opposite to each other, for the temporary accommodation of the speakers. These exercises con- sisted simply of a memoriter repetition, with some action, of speeches, sKghtly abridged, which had actually been delivered in a real debate on the floor of the House of Commons. But they served to familiarize Canadian lads with the names and characters of the great statesmen of England, and with what was to be said on both sides of several important public questions ; they also probably awakened in many a young spirit an ambition, after- wards gratified, of being distinguished as a legislator in earnest. On public days the Debates were held up-stairs on a platform at the east end of a long room with a partially vaulted ceiling, on the south side of the building. On this platform the public recita- tions also took place ; and here on some of the anniversaries a drama by Milman or Hannah Moore was enacted. Here we ourselves took part in one of the hymns or choruses of the " Martyr of Antioch." (Other reminiscences of Dr. Strachan, the District Grammar School, and Toronto generally, are embodied in " The First Bishop of Toronto, a Review and a Study," a small work published by the writer in i86S.) The immediate successor of Dr. Strachan in the school was Mr. Samuel Armour, a graduate of Glasgow, whose profile resembled that of Cicero, as shewn in some engravings. Being fond of sport- ing, his excitement was great when the flocks of wild pigeons were passing over the town, and the report of fire-arms in all directions was to be heard. During the hours of school his attention, on these occasions, would be much drawn off from the class-subjects. In those days there was not a plentiful supply in the town of every book wanted in the school. The only copy that could be procured of a " Eutropius,'' which we ourselves on a particular occasion required, was one with an English translation at the end. The book was bought, Mr. Armour stipulating that the English portion of the volume should be sewn up ; in fact, he himself stitched the leaves together. — In Mr. Armour's time there was, for some reason now forgotten, a barring-out. A pile of heavy wood (sticks of cordwood whole used then to be thrust into the great §11.] Church Street : Old Grammar School. 167 ■school-room stove) was built against the door within ; and the master had to effect, and did effect, an entrance into his school through a window on the north side. Mr. Armour became after- wards a clergyman of the English Church, and officiated for many years in the township of Cavan. The master who succeeded Mr. Armour was Dr. Phillips, who -came out from England to take charge of the school. He had been previously master of a school at Whitchurch, in Hereford- shire. His degree was from Cambridge, where he graduated as a B. A. of Queen's in the year 1805. He was a venerable-looking man — the very ideal, outwardly, of an English country parson of an old type — a figure in the general scene, that would have been taken note of congenially by Fuller or Antony h, Wood. The cos- tume in which he always appeared (shovel-hat included), was that usually assumed by the senior clergy some years ago. He also wore powder in the hair except when in mourning. According to the standards of the day. Dr. Phillips was an accomplished scholar, and a good reader and writer of English. He introduced into the school at York the English public-school traditions of the strictest type. His text books were those published and used at Eton, as Eton then was. The Eton Latin Grammar, without note or comment, displaced " Ruddiman's Rudiments " — the book to which we had previously been accustomed, and which really did give hints of something rational underlying what we learnt out of it. Even the Eton Greek Grammar, in its purely mediseval un- translated state, made its appearance : it was through the medium of that very uninviting manual that we obtained our earliest ac- quaintance with the first elements of the Greek tongue. Our " Palaphatus " and other Extracts in the Grceca Minora were translated by us, not into English, but into Latin, in which lan- guage all the notes and elucidations of difficulties in that book were given. Very many of the Greek " genitives absolute," we re- member, were to be rendered by quum, with a subjunctive pluper- fect—an enormous mystery to us at the time. Our Lexicon was Schrevelius, as yet un-Englished. For the Greek Testament we had " Dawson," a vocabulary couched in the Latin tongue, not- withstanding the author's name. The chevaux-de-frise set up across the pathways to knowledge were numerous and most for- bidding. The Latin translation, Hne for line, at the end of Clarke's Homer, as also the Ordo in the Delphin classics, were held to be 1 68 Toronto of Old. [§11- mischievous aids, but the help was slight that could be derived from them, as the Latin language itself was not yet grasped. For whatever of the anomalous we moderns may observe in all this, let the good old traditional school-system of England be re- sponsible — not the accompUshed and benevolent man who trans- planted the system, pure and simple, to Canadian ground. For ourselves : in one point of view, we deem it a piece of singular good fortune to have been subjected for a time to this sort of drill; for it has enabled us to enter with more intelligence into the dis- cussions on EngUsh education that have marked the era in which we live. Without this morsel of experience we should have known only by vague report what it was the reviewers and essayists of England were aiming their fulminations against. Our early recollections in this regard, we treasure up now among our mental curiosities, with thankfulness : just as we treasure up our memories of the few years which, in the days of our youth, we had an opportunity of passing in the old father-land, while yet mail coaches and guards and genuine coachmen were extant there ; while yet the time-honoured watchman was to be heard patrolling the streets at night and calling the hours. Deprived of this personal experience, how tamely would have read " School-days at Rugby,'*^ for example, or " The Scouring of the White Horse," and many another healthy classic in recent EngHsh literature — to say nothing of " The Sketch Book," and earHer pieces, which involve numer- ous allusions to these now vanished entities ! Moreover, we found that our boyish initiation in the Eton for- mularies, however little they may have contributed to the intellect- ual furniture of the mind at an early period, had the effect of putting us en rapport, in one relation at all events, with a large class in the old country. We found that the stock quotations and scraps of Latin employed to give an air of learning to discourse, " to point a moral and adorn a tale," among the country-clergy of England and among members of Parliament of the ante-Reform-bill period, were mostly relics of school-boy lore derived from Eton books. Fragments of the As in prasenti, of the Propria qucB maribus ; shreds from the Syntax, as Vir bonus est quis, Ingenuas didicisse, and a score more, were instantly recognized, and constituted a kind of talismanic mode of communication, making the quoter and the hearer, to some extent, akin. Furthermore ; in regard to our honoured and beloved master. § ii.j Church Street : Old Grammar Sckocl. 169 Dr. Phillips himself; there is this advantage to be named as enjoyed by those whose lot it was, in this new region, to pass a portion of their impressible youth in the society of such a character : it fur- nished them with a visible concrete illustration of much that other- wise would have been a vague abstraction in the pictures of English society set before the fancy in the Spectator, for instance, or Boswell's Johnson, and other standard literary productions of a century ago. As it is, we doubt not that the experience of many of our Canadian coevals corresponds with our own. Whenever we read of the good Vicar of Wakefield, or of any similar personage ; when in the biography of some distinguished man, a kind-hearted old clerical tutor comes upon the scene, or one moulded to be a college-fellow, or one that had actually been a college-fellow, carrying about with him, when down in the country the tastes and ideas of the academic cloister — it is the figure of Dr. Phillips that rises before the mental vision. And without doubt he was no bad embodiment of the class of English character just al- luded to. — He was thoroughly English in his predilections and tone ; and he unconsciously left on our plastic selves traces of his own temperament and style. It was from Dr. Phillips we received our first impressions of Cambridge life ; of its outer form, at all events ; of its traditions and customs ; of the Acts and Opponencies in its Schools, and other quaint formalities, still in use in our own undergraduate day, but now abolished : from him we first heard of Trumpington, and St. Mary's, and the Gogmagogs; of Lady Margaret and the cloisters at Queen's; of the wooden bridge and Erasmus' walk in the gar- dens of that college ; and of many another storied object and spot, afterwards very familiar. A manuscript Journal of a Johnsonian cast kept by Dr. Phillips, when a youth, during a tour of his on foot in Wales, lent to us for perusal, marks an era in our early experience, awakening in us, as it did, our first inklings of travel. The excursion described was a trifling one in itself — only from Whitchurch, in Hereford- shire, across the Severn into Wales — but to the unsophisticated fancy of a boy it was invested with a peculiar charm ; and it led, we think, in our own case, to many an ambitious ramble, in after years, among cities and men. — In the time of Dr. Phillips there was put up, by subscription, across the whole ofthe western end of the school-house, over the door, a rough lean-to, of considerable di- 170 Toronto of Old. [§ di- mensions. A large covered space was thus provided for purposes of recreation in bad weather. This room is memorable as being associated with our first acquaintance with the term " Gymnasium :" that was the title which we were directed to give it— There is ex- tant, we believe, a good portrait in oil of Dr. Phillips. It was stated above that Cricket was not known in the playground of the District Grammar School, except possibly under the mildest of forms. Nevertheless, one, afterwards greatly distinguished in the local annals of Cricket, was long a master in the School. Mr. George Antony Barber accompanied Dr. Phillips to York in 1825, as his principal assistant, and continued to be associated with him in that capacity. Nearly half a century later than 1826, when Cricket had now become a social institution throughout Western Canada, Mr. Barber, who had been among the first to give enthusiastic encouragement to the manly English game, was the highest living local authority on the subject, and still an occa- sional participator in the sport. We here close our notice of the Old Blue School at York. In many a brain, from time to time, the mention of its name has ex- ercised a spell like that of Wendell Holmes's Mare Rubrum ; as potent as that was, to summon up memories and shapes from the Red Sea of the Past — " Where clad in burning robes are laid Life's blossomed joys untimely shed, And where those cherish'd forms are laid We miss awhile, and call them dead." The building itself has been shifted bodily from its original po- sition to the south-east corner of Stanley and Jarvis Street. It, the centre of so many associations, is degraded now into being a depot for " General Stock ;" in other words, a receptacle for Rags and Old Iron. The six acres of play-ground are thickly built over. A thorough- fare of ill-repute traverses it from west to east. This street was at first called March Street ; and under that appellation acquired an evil report. It was hoped that a nobler designation would perhaps elevate the character of the place, as the name " Milton Street " had helped to do for the ignoble Grub Street in London. But the purlieus of the neighbourhood' continue, unhappily, to be the Alsatia of the town. The filling up of the old breezy field with dwelUngs, for the most part of a wretched class, has driven " the schoolmaster" §11.] Church Street: Old Grammar School. 171 away from the region. His return to the locality, in some good missionary sense, is much to be wished ; and after a time, will probably be an accomplished fact. [Since these lines were written, the old District Grammar School building has wholly vanished. It will be consolatory to know that, escaping destruction by fire, it was deliberately dismantled and taken to pieces ; and, at once, walls of substantial brick over, spread the whole of the space which it had occupied.] XII. KING STREET FROM CHURCH STREET TO GEORGE STREET. J E were arrested in our progress on King Street by St. James' Church. Its associations, and those of the District Grammar School and its play-ground to the north, have detained us long. We now return to the point reached when our recollections compelled us to digress. Before proceeding, however, we must record the fact that the break in the line of building on the north side of the street here, was the means of checking the tide of fire which was rolling irresistibly westward, in the great conflagration of 1849. The energies of the local fire-brigade of the day had never been so taxed as they were on that memorable occasion. Aid from steam- power was then undreamt-of Simultaneous outbursts of flame from numerous widely-separated spots had utterly disheart- ened every one, and had caused a general abandonment of effort to quell the conflagration. Then it was that the open space about St. James' Church saved much of the town from destruction. To the west, the whole sky was, as it were, a vast canopy of meteors streaming from the east. The church itself was consumed, but the flames advanced no further. A burning shingle was seen to become entangled in the luffer-boards of the belfry, and slowly to ignite the woodwork there : from a very minute start at that point, a stream of fire soon began to rise — soon began to twine itself about the upper stages of the tower, and to climb nimbly up the steep slope of the spire, from the summit of which it then shot aloft into the air, speedily enveloping and overtopping the golden cross that was there. § 12.] King Street, from Church to George Sts. 173 At the same time the flames made their way downwards within the tower, till the internal timbers of the roofing over the main body of the building were reached. There, in the natural order of things, the fire readily spread ; and the whole interior of the church, in the course of an hour, was transformed, before the eyes of a bewildered multitude looking powerlessly on, first into a vast " burning fiery furnace," and then, as the roof collapsed and fell, into a confused chaos of raging flame. The heavy gilt cross at the apex of the spire came down with a crash, and planted itself in the pavement of the principal entrance below, where the steps, as well as the inner-walls of the base of the tower, were bespattered far and wide with the molten metal of the great bell. While the work of destruction was'going fiercely and irrepressi- bly on, the Public Clock in the belfry, Mr. Draper's gift to the town, was heard to strike the hour as usual, and the quarters thrice — exercising its functions and having its appointed say, amidst the sympathies, not loud but deep, of those who watched its doom ; bearing its testimony, like a martyr at the stake, in calm and unim- passioned strain, up to the very moment of time when the deadly element touched its vitals. Opposite the southern portal of St. James' Church was to be seen, at a very early period, the conspicuous trade-sign of a well- known furrier of York, Mr. Joseph Rogers. It was the figure of an Indian Trapper holding a gun, and accompanied by a dog, all depicted in their proper colours on a high, upright tablet set over the doorway of the store below. Besides being an appropriate symbol of the business carried on, it was always an interesting re- minder of the time, then not so very remote, when all of York, or Toronto, and its commerce that existed, was the old French trad- ing-post on the common to the west, and a few native hunters of the woods congregating with their packs of " beaver" once or twice a-year about the entrance to its picketted enclosure. Other rather early dealers in furs in York were Mr. Jared Stocking and Mr. John Bastedo. In the Gazette ior April 25, 1822, we notice a somewhat preten- tious advertisement, headed " Muskrats," which announces that the highest market price will be given in cash for "good seasona- ble muskrat skins and other furs at the store of Robert Coleman, Esquire, Market Place, YorL" 1 74 Toronto of Old. |_§ 1 2, Mr. Rogers' descendants continue to occupy the identical site on King Street indicated above, and the Indian Trapper, reno- vated, is still to be seen — a pleasant instance of Canadian persist- ence and stability. In Great Britain and Europe generally, the thoroughfares of an- cient towns had, as we know, character and variety given them by the trade-symbols displayed up and down their misty vistas. Charles the First gave, by letters patent, express permission to the citizens of London " to expose and hang in and over the streets, and ways, and alleys of the said city and suburbs of the same, signs and posts of signs, affixed to their houses and shops, for the better finding out such citizens' dwellings, shops, arts, and occu- pations, without impediment, molestation or interruption of his heirs or. successors." And the practice was in vogue long before the time of Charles. It preceded the custom of distinguishing houses by numbers. At periods when the population generally were unable to read, such rude appeals to the eye had, of course, their use. But as education spread, and architecture of a modern style came to be preferred, this mode of indicating " arts and occu- pations" grew out of fashion. Of late, however, the pressure of competition in business has been driving men back again upon the customs of by-gone illiterate generations. For the purpose of establishing a distinct indivi- duality in the public mind the most capricious freaks are played. The streets of the modern Toronto exhibit, we believe, two leonine specimens of auro-ligneous zoology, between which the sex is an- nounced to constitute the difference. The lack of such clear dis- tinction between a pair of glittering symbols of this genus and spe- cies, in our Canadian London, was the occasion of much grave consideration in 1867, on the part of the highest authority in our Court of Chancery. Although in that cause dlhbre, after a careful physiognomical study by means of photographs transmitted, it was allowed that there were points of difference between the two spe- cimens in question, as, for example, that " one looked older than the other;" that "one, from the sorrowful expression of its coun- tenance, seemed more resigned to its position than the other"— still the decree was issued for the removal of one of them from the scene — very properly the later-carved of the two. Of the ordinary trade-signs that were to be seen along the tho- roughfare of King Street no particular notice need be taken. The § 12.] King Street, from Church to George Sts. 175 Pestle and Mortar, the Pole twined round with the black strap, the Crowned Boot, the Tea-chest, the Axe, the Broad-axe, the Saw, (mill, cross-cut and circular), the colossal Fowling-piece, the Cook- ing-stove, the Plough, the Golden Fleece, the Anvil and Sledge- Hammer, the magnified Horse-Shoe, each told its own story, as in- dicating indispensable wares or occupations. Passing eastward from the painted effigy of the Indian Trapper, we soon came in front of the Market Place, which, so long as only a low wooden building occupied its centre, had an open, airy ap- pearance. We have already dwelt upon some of the occurrences and associations connected with this spot. On King street, about here, the ordinary trade and traffic of the place came, after a few years, to be concentrated. Here business and bustle were every day, more or less, created by the usual wants of the inhabitants, and by the wants of the country farmers whose waggons in summer, and sleighs in winter, thronged in from the north, east and west. And hereabout at one moment or another, every lawful day, would be surely seen, coming and going, the oddities and street-characters of the town and neighbourhood. Having devoted some space to the leading and prominent person- ages of our drama, it will be only proper to bestow a few words on the subordinates, the Calibans and Gobbos, the Nyms and Touch- stones, of the piece. From the various nationalities and races of which the commu- nity was a mixture, these were drawn. There was James O'Hara, for example, a poor humourous Irishman, a perfect representative of his class in costume, style and manner, employed as bellman at auctions, and so on. When the town was visited by the Papyro- tomia — travelling cutters-out of likenesses in black paper, (some years ago such things created a sensation), — a full-length of O'Hara was suspended at the entrance to the rooms, recognized at once by every eye, even without the aid of the " Shoot easy" inscribed on a label issuing from the mouth. (In the Loyalist of Nov. 24, 1827, we have O'Hara's death noted. " Died on Friday the 16th instant, James O'Hara, long an inhabitant of this Town, and for- merly a soldier in His Majesty's service.") — There was Jock Mur- ray, the Scotch carter ; and after him, William Pettit, the English one : and the carter who drove the horse with the " spring-halt ;" (every school-lad in the place was familiar with the peculiar twitch upwards of the near hind leg in the gait of this nag.) 176 Toronto of Old. [§12, The negro population was small. Every individual of colour was recognizable at sight. Black Joe and WhistUng Jack were two notabilities ; both of them negroes of African birth. In military- bands a negro drummer or cymbal-player was formerly often to be seen. The two men just named, after obtaining discharge from a regiment here, gained an honest livelihood by chance employment about the town. Joe, a well-formed, well-trained figure, was to be seen, still arrayed in some old cast-off shell-jacket, acting as porter, ■or engaged about horses ; once already we have had a glimpse of him in the capacity of sheriff's assistant, administering the lash to wretched culprits in the Market Place. The other, besides play- ing other parts, officiated occasionally as a sweep ; but his most memorable accomplishment was a melodious and powerful style of -whistling musical airs, and a faculty for imitating the bag-pipes to perfection. — For the romantic sound of the name, the talj, comely negress, Amy Pompadour, should also be mentioned in the record. But she was of servile descent : at the time at which we write sla- very was only just dying out in Upper Canada, as we shall have occasion to note hereafter more at large. Then came the " Jack of Clubs." Lord Thurlow, we are told, once enabled a stranger to single out in a crowd Dunning, after- wards Lord Ashburton, by telling him to take notice of the first man he saw bearing a strong resemblance to the " Jack of Clubs." In the present case it was a worthy trader in provisions who had acquired among his fellow-townsmen a sobriquet from a supposed likeness to that sturdy court-card figure. He was a short, burly EngUshman, whose place of business was just opposite the en- trance to the Market. So absolutely did the epithet attach itself to him, that late-comers to the place failed to learn his real name: all which was good-humouredly borne for a time ; but at last the distinction became burdensome and irritating, and Mr. Stafford re- moved in disgust to New York. A well-known character often to be seen about here, too, was an unfortunate English farmer of the name of Cowper, of disordered intellect, whose peculiarity was a desire to station himself in the middle of the roadway, and from that vantage-ground to harangue any crowd that might gather, incoherently, but always with a great show of sly drollery and mirthfalness. On occasions of militia funeral processions, observant lads and others were always on the look-out for a certain prosperous cord- ^ 1 2. J King Strestjfrom Church to George Sts. 177 •wainer of the town of York, Mr. Wilson, who was sure then to be seen marching in the ranks, with musket reversed, and displaying with great precision and solemnity the extra-upright carriage and genuine toe-pointed step of the soldier of the days of George the Second. He had been for sixteen years in the 41st regiment, and ten years and forty-four days in the 103rd ; and it was with pride and gusto that he exhibited the high proficiency to which he had in other days attained. The slow pace required by the Dead March gave the on-looker time to study the antique style of miUtary move- ment thus exemplified. It was at a comparatively late period that Sir John Smythe and Spencer Lydstone, poets, were notabilities in the streets ; the lat- ter, Mr. Lydstone, recognizable from afar by a scarlet vest, brought out, ever and anon, a printed broadside, filled with eulogiums or satires on the inhabitants of the town, regulated by fees or refusals received. The former. Sir John Smythe, found in the public papers a place for his productions, which by their syntacti- cal irregularities and freedom from marks of punctuation, proved their author (as a reviewer of the day once observed) to be a man supra grammaticam, and one possessed of a genius above com- mas. But his great hobby was a railway to the Pacific, in con- nection with which he brought out a lithographed map : its peculiarity was a straight black line conspicuously drawn across the continent firom Fort William to the mouth of the Columbia river. In a tract of his on the subject of this railway he provides, in the case of war with the United States, for steam communication between London in England and China and the East Indies, by " a branch to run on the north side of the township of Cavan and on the south side of Balsam Lake." " I propose this,'' he says, '" to run in the rear of Lake Huron and in the rear of Lake Superior, twenty miles in the interior of the country of the Lake aforesaid ; to unite with the railroad from Lake Superior to Winnipeg, at the south-west main trading-post of the North- West Company." The document is signed " Sir John Smythe, Baronet and Royal Engi- neer, Canadian Poet, LL.D., and Moral Philosopher." The concourse of traflfickers and idlers in the open space before the old Market Place were free of tongue ; they sometimes talked, in no subdued tone, of their fellow-townsfolk of all ranks. In a small community every one was more or less acquainted with every L 178 Toronto of Old. [§ 12.. one, with his dealings and appurtenances, with his man-servant and maid-servant, his horse, his dog, his waggon, cart or barrow. Those of the primitive residentiaries, to whom the commonalty- had taken kindly, were honoured in ordinary speech with their militia-titles of Colonel, Major, Captain, or the civilian prefix of Mister, Honourable Mister, Squire or Judge, as the case might be; whilst others, not held to have achieved any special claims to de- ference, were named, even in mature years, by their plain, baptis- mal names, John, Andrew, Duncan, George, and so on. And then, there was a third marking-ofif of a few, against whom,, for some vague reason or another, there had grown up in the popu- lar mind a certain degree of prejudice. These, by a curtailment or national corruption of their proper prenomen, would be ordin- arily styled Sandy this, Jock that. In some instances the epithet ," old " would irreverently precede, and persons of considerable eminence might be heard spoken of as old Tom so-and-so, old Sam such-a-one. And similarly in respect to the sons and nephews of these worthy gentlemen. Had the community never been replenished from outside sources, few of them would, to the latest moment of their lives, have ever been distinguished except by the plain John, Stephen, Allan, Christopher, and so on, of their infancy, or by the Bill, Harry, Alec, Mac, Dolph, Dick, or Bob, acquired in the nursery or school. But enough has been said, for the present at least, on the hu- mours and ways of our secondary characters, as exemplified in the crowd customarily gathered in front of the old Market at York. We shall now proceed on our prescribed route. The lane leading northward from the north-west comer of Mar- ket Square used to be known as Stuart's Lane, from the Rev. George Okill Stuart, once owner of property here. On its west side was a well-known inn, the Farmers' Arms, kept by Mr. Bloor, who, on retiring from business, took up his abode at Yorkville^ where it has curiously happened that his name has been attached to a fashionable street, the thoroughfare formerly known as the Concession Line. The street running north from the north-east angle of Market Square, now known as Nelson Street, was originally New Street, a name which was commemorative of the growth of York westward. The terminal street of the town on the west, prior to the opening § 12.] King Street, from Church to George Sts. 179 of this New Street, had been George Street. The name of " New Street " should never have been changed, even for the heroic one of Nelson. As the years rolled on, it would have become a quaint misnomer, invohing a tale, like the name of " New College " at Oxford — a College about five hundred years old. At a point about half-vvay between New Street and George Street, King Street was, in 1849, the scene of an election fracas which, in distant quarters, damaged for a time the good name of the town. While passing in front of the Coleraine House, an inn on the north side of the street, and a rendezvous of the unsuccessful party, some persons walking in procession, in addition to indulg- ing in the usual harmless groans, flung a missile into the house, when a shot, fired from one of the windows, killed a man in the con- course below. Owing to the happy settlement of numerous irritating public questions, elections are conducted now, in our towns and through- out our Provinces, in a calm and rational temper for the most part. Only two relics of evil and ignorant days remain amongst us, stirring bad blood twice a year, on anniversaries consecrated, or otherwise, to the object. A generous-hearted nation, trans- planted as they have been almost en masse to a new continent, where prosperity, wealth and honours have everywhere been their portion, would shew more wisdom in the repudiation than they do in the recognition and studied conservation, of these hateful heir- looms of their race. XIII. KING STREET — DIGRESSION INTO DUKE STREET. N passing George Street, as we intimated a moment ago, we enter the parallelogram which constituted the original town-plot. Its boundaries were George Street, Duchess Street, Ontario Street (with the lane south of it), and Palace Street. From this, its old core, York spread westward and northward, extending at length in those directions respectively (under the name of Toronto) to the Asylum and Yorkville ; while eastward its developments — though here less solid and less shapely — were finally bounded by the windings of the Don. Were Toronto an old town on the Eu- ropean Continent, George Street, Duchess Street, Ontario Street and Palace Street, would probably now be boulevards, showing the space once occupied by stout stone walls. The parallelogram just defined represents "the City" in modern London, or "la Cit6" in modern Paris — the original nucleus round which gradually clustered the dwellings of later generations. Before, however, we enter upon what may be styled King Street proper, it will be convenient to make a momentary digression northwards into Duke Street, anciently a quiet, retired thorough- fare, skirted on the right and left by the premises and grounds and houses of several most respectable inhabitants. At the north-west angle of the intersection of this street with George Street was the home of Mr. Washburn ; but this was comparatively a recent erec- tion. Its site previously had been the brickyard of Henry Hale, a builder and contractor, who put up the wooden structure, possess- ing some architectural pretensions, on the south-east angle of the §13-] King Street : fLuke Street. i8i same intersection, diagonally across ; occupied in the second instance by Mr. Moore, of the Commissariat ; then by Dr. Lee, and afterwards by Mr. J. Murchison. (The last named was for a long time the Stultz of York, supply- ing all those of its citizens, young and old, who desired to make an attractive or intensely respectable appearance, with vestments in fine broadcloth.) A little to the north, on the left side of George Street, was the famous Ladies' School of Mrs. Goodman, presided over subse- quently by Miss Purcell and Miss Rose. This had been previously the homestead of Mr. Stephen Jarvis, of whom again immediately. — Two or three of these familiar names appear in an an advertise- ment relating to land in this neighbourhood, in the Gazette of March 23rd, 1826. — " For Sale : Three lots or parcels of land in the town of York, the property of Mrs. Goodman, being part of the premises on which Miss Purcell now resides, and formerly owned by Col. Jarvis. The lots are each fifty feet in width and one hundred and thirty in depth, and front on the street running from King Street to Mr. Jarvis's Park lot. If not disposed of by private sale, they will be put up at auction on the first day of May next. Application to be made to Miss Purcell, or at the Office of the U. C. Gazette. York, March 10, 1826." Advancing on Duke Street eastward a little way, we came, on the left, to the abode of Chief Justice Sir William Campbell, of whom before. Sir William erected here in 1822 a mansion of brick, in good style. It was subsequently, for many years, the hospi- table home of the Hon. James Gordon, formerly of Amherstburgh. Then on the right, one square beyond, at the south-easterly comer where Caroline Street intersects, we reached the house of Mr. Secretary Jarvis, a man of great note in his day, whose name is familiar to all who have occasion to examine the archives of Upper Canada in the administrations of Governors Simcoe, Hunter and Gore. A fine portrait of him exists, but, as we have been informed, it has been transmitted to relatives in England. Mr. Stephen Jarvis, above named, was long the Registrar of Upper Canada. His hand-writing is well-known to all holders of early deeds. He and the Secretary were first cousins ; of the same stock as the well- known Bishop Jarvis of Connecticut, and the Church Historian, Dr. Samuel Farmer Jarvis. Both were officers in incorporated Colonial regiments before the independence of the United States ; 1 82 Toronto of Old. [§ I3- and both came to Canada as United Empire Loyalists. Mr. Stephen Jarvis was the founder of the leading Canadian family to which the first Sheriff Jarvis belonged. Mr. Samuel Peters Jarvis, from whom "Jarvis Street" has its name, was the son of Mr. Secretary Jarvis. On the left, one square beyond the abode of Mr. Secretary Jarvis, came the premises and home of Mr. Surveyor General Ridout, the latter a structure still to be seen in its primitive out- lines, a good specimen of the old type of early Upper Canadian family residence of a superior class ; combining the qualities of solidity and durability with those of snugness and comfort in the rigours of winter and the heats of summer. In the rear of Mr. Ridout's house was for some time a family burial-plot ; but, like several similar private enclosures in the neighbourhood of the town, it became disused after the establishment of regular cemeteries. Nearly opposite Mr. Ridout's, in one of the usual long, low Upper Canadian one-storey dwellings, shaded by lofty Lombardy poplars, was the home of the Mclntoshes, who are to be commemorated hereafter in connection with the Marine of York : and here, at a later period, lived for a long time Mr. Andrew Warffe and his brother John. Mr. Andrew Warffe was a well-known employ^ in the office of the Inspector General, Mr. Baby, and a lieutenant in the Incorporated Militia. By one of the vicissitudes common in the history of family resi- dences everywhere, Mr. Secretary Jarvis's house, which we just now passed, became afterwards the place of business of a memo- rable cutler and gunsmith, named Isaac Columbus. During the war of 1812, Mr. Columbus was employed as armourer to the Militia, and had a forge near the garrison. Many of the swords used by the Militia officers were actually manufactured by him. He was a native of France ; a liberal-hearted man, ever ready to contribute to charitable objects ; and a clever artizan. Whether required to "jump" the worn and battered axe of a backwoodsman, to manufacture the skate-irons and rudder of an ice-boat, to put in order a surveyor's theodolite, or to replace for the young geome- trician or draughtsman an instrument lost out of his case, he was equally au fait. On occasion he could even supply an elderly lady or gentleman with a set of false teeth, and insert them. In our boyhood we had occasion to get many little matters at- tended to at Mr. Columbus's. Once on leaving word that a certain § 13.J King Street : (Duke Street. 183 article must be ready by a particular hour, we remember being in- formed that " must" was only for the King of France. His politi- cal absolutism would have satisfied Louis XIV. himself. He positively refused to have anything to do with the " Hberals" of York, •expressly on the ground that, in his opinion, the modern ideas of government " hindered the King from acting as a good father to the people." An expression of his, " first quality, blue !" used on a particular ■occasion in reference to an extra finish to be given to some steel- work for an extra price, passed into a proverb among us boys at -school, and was extensively applied by us to persons and things of which we desired to predicate a high degree of excellence. Over Columbus's workshop, at the corner of Caroline Street, we -are pretty sure his name appeared as here given ; and so it was always called. But we observe in some lists of early names in York, that it is given as " Isaac Collumbes." It is curious to note that the great discoverer' s name is a latinization of Colon, Coulon, Colombe, descendant each of columba, dove, of which columbus is :the masculine form. XIV. KING STREET FROM GEORGE STREET TO CAROLINE STREET. j E now retrace our steps to King Street, at its inter- section with George Street ; and here our eye im- mediately hghts on an object connected with the early history of Education in York. Attached to the east side of the house at the south-east angle of the intersection is a low building, wholly of stone, resembling a small root-house. Its struc- ture is concealed from view now by a coating of clapboards. This was the first school-house possessing a public character in York. It was where Dr. Stuart taught, afterwards Archdeacon of Kings- ton. The building was on his property, which became afterwards that of Mr. George Duggan, once before referred to. (In connec- tion with St. James' Church, it should have been recorded that Mr. Duggan was the donor and planter of the row of Lombardy poplars which formerly stood in front of that edifice, and which figured conspicuously in the old engravings of King Street. He was an Irishman of strong opinions. He once stood for the town against Mr. Attorney-General Robinson, but without success. When the exigencies of later times required the uprooting of the poplar trees, now become overgrown, he warmly resented the re- moval and it was at the risk of grievous bodily harm that the Church-warden of the day, Mr. T. D. Harris, carried into effect the resolution of the Vestry.) Dr. Stuart's was the Home District School. From a contem- porary record, now before us, we learn that it opened on June the first, 1807, and that the first names entered on its books were § 14-] King Street, from George to Caroline Sts. 185 those of John Ridout, William A. Hamilton, Thomas G. Hamil- ton, George H. Detlor, George S. Boulton, Robert Stanton, Wil- liam Stanton, Angus McDonell, Alexander Hamilton, Wilson Hamilton, Robert Ross, Allan McNab. To this list, from time to time, were added many other old Toronto or Upper Canadian names : as, for example, the following : John Moore, Charles Ruggles, Edward Hartney, Charles Boulton, Alexander Chewett, Donald McDonell, James Edward Small, Charles Small, John Hayes, George and William Jarvis, William Bowkett, Peter Mc- Donell, Philemon Squires, James Mcintosh, Bernard, Henry and Marshall Glennon, Richard Brooke, Daniel Brooke, Charles Reade, William Robinson, Gilbert Hamilton, Henry Ernst, John Gray, Robert Gray, William Cawthra, William Smith, Harvey Woodruff, Robert Anderson, Benjamin Anderson, James Givins, Thomas Playter, William Pilkington. The French names Belcour, Hammeil and Marian occur. (There were bakers or copfectioners of these names in York at an early period.) From the same record it appears that female pupils were not ex- cluded from the primitive Home District School. On the roll are names which surviving contemporaries would recognize as belong- ing to the beau monde of Upper Canada, distinguished and ad- mired in later years. A building-lot, eighty-six feet in front and one hundred and seventeen in depth, next to the site of the school, is offered for sale in the Gazette of the i8th of March, 1822 ; and in the advertisement it is stated to be " one of the most eligible lots in the Town of York, and situated in King Street, in the centre of the Town." To the left, just across from this choice position, was, in 1833, Wragg & Co.'s establishment, where such matter-of-fact articles as the following could be procured " Bending and unbending nails, as usual ; wrought nails and spikes of all sizes [a change since 1810] : ox-traces and cable chains ; tin ; double and single sheet iron : sheet brass and copper ; bar, hoop, bolt and rod iron of all sizes ; shear, blister and cast steel ; with every other article in the heavy line, together with a very complete assortment of shelf goods, cordage, oakum, tar, pitch, and rosin : also a few patent ma- chines for shelling corn." (A much earlier resort for such mer- chandize was Mr. Peter Paterson's, on the west side of the Market Square.) 1 86 Toronto of Old. [§ 14. Of a date somewhat subsequent to that of Messrs. Wragg's ad- vertisement, was the dep6t of Mr. Harris for similar substantial wares. This was situated on the north side of King Street, west- ward of the point at which we are now pausing. It long resisted ' the great conflagration of 1849, towering up amidst the flames like a black, isolated crag in a tempestuous sea ; but at length it succumbed. Having been rendered, as it was supposed, fire- proof externally, no attempt was made to remove the contents of the building. To the east of Messrs. Wragg's place of business, on the same side, and dating back to an early period, was the dwelling house and mart of Mr. Mosley, the principal auctioneer and appraiser of York, a well-known and excellent man. He had suffered the severe calamity of a partial deprivation of the lower limbs by frost- bite ; but he contrived to move about with great activity in a room or on the side-walk by means of two light chairs, shifting himself adroitly from the one to the other. When required to go to a distance or to church, (where he was ever punctually to be seen in his place), he was lifted by his son or sons into and out of a wagonette, together with the chairs. On the same (north) side was the place where the Messrs. Lesslie, enterprising and successful merchants from Dundee, dealt at once in two remunerative articles — books and drugs. The left side of the store was devoted to the latter ; the right to the former. Their first head-quarters in York had been further up the street ; but a move had been made to the eastward, to be, as things were then, nearer the heart of the town. This firm had houses carrying on the same combined businesses in Kingston and Dundas. There exists a bronze medal or token, of good design, sought after by collectors, bearing the legend, " E. Lesslie and Sons, Toronto and Dundas, 1822." The date has been perplexing, as the town was not named Toronto in 1822. The intention simply was to indicate the year of the founding of the firm in the two towns ; the first of which assumed the name of Toronto at the period the medal was really struck, viz., 1834. On the obverse it bears a figure of Justice with scales and sword : on the reverse, a plough with the mottoes, " Prosperity to Canada," "La Prudence et la Candeur." — A smaller Token of the same firm is extant, on which " Kingston " is inserted between " Toronto " and " Dundas." § 14-] King Street, from George to Caroline Sts. 187 Nearly opposite was the store of Mr. Monro. Regarding our King Street as the Broadway of York, Mr. Monro was for a long time its Stewart. But the points about his premises that linger now in our recollection the most, are a tasteful flower-garden on its west side, and a trellised verandah in that direction, with cana- ries in a cage, usually singing therein. Mr. Monro was Mayor of Toronto in 1840. He also represented in Parliament the South Riding of York, in the Session of 1844-5. At the north-west corner, a little further on, resided Mr. Alex- ander Wood, whose name appears often in the Report of the Loyal and Patriotic Society of 181 2, to which reference before has been made, and of which he was the Secretary. A brother of his, at first in copartnership with Mr. Allan, and at a later period, independently, had made money, at York, by business. On the decease of his brother, Mr. Alexander Wood came out to attend to the property left. He continued on the same spot, until after the war of 18 12, the commercial operations which had been so prosperously begun, and then retired. At the time to which our recollections are just now transporting us, the windows of the part of the house that had been the store were always seen with the shutters closed. Mr. Wood was a bachelor ; and it was no uncosy sight, towards the close of the shortening autumnal days, before the remaining front shutters of the house were drawn in for the evening, to catch a glimpse, in passing, of the interior of his comfortable quarters, lighted up by the blazing logs on the hearth, the table standing duly spread close by, and the solitary himself ruminating in his chair before the fire, waiting for candles and dinner to be brought in. On sunny mornings in winter he was often to be seen pacing the sidewalk in front of his premises for exercise, arrayed in a long blue over-coat, with his right hand thrust for warmth into the cuff of his left sleeve, and his left hand into that of his right. He afterwards returned to Scotland, where, at Stonehaven, not far from Aberdeen, he had family estates known as Woodcot and Woodburnden. He died without executing a will ; and it was some time before the rightful heir to his property in Scotland and here was determined. It had been his intention, we believe, to return to Canada. — The streets which run eastward from Yonge Street, north of Carleton Street, named respectively " Wood " and "Alex- ander," pass across land that belonged to Mr. Wood. 1 88 Toronto of Old. [§ 14. Many are the shadowy forms that rise before us, as we proceed on our way ; phantom-revisitings from the misty Past ; the shapes and faces of enterprising and painstaking men, of whose fortunes King Street hereabout was the cradle. But it is not necessary in these reminiscences to enumerate all who, on the right hand and on the left, along the now comparatively deserted portions of the great thoroughfare, amassed wealth in the olden time by commerce and other honourable pursuits, — laying the foundation, in several instances, of opulent famihes. Quetton St. George, however, must not be omitted, builder of the solid and enduring house on the corner opposite to Mr. Wood's ; a structure that, for its size and air of respectability ; for its ma- terial, brick, when as yet all the surrounding habitations were of wood ; for its tinned roof, its graceful porch, its careful and neat finish generally, was, for a long time, one of the York lions. Mr. Quetton St. George was a French royalist officer, and a chevalier of the order of St. Louis. With many other French gen- tlemen, he emigrated to Canada at the era of the Revolution. He was of the class of the noblesse, as all officers were required to be ; which class, just before the Revolution, included, it is saidj 90,000 persons, all exempt from the ordinary taxes of the country. The surname of St. George was assumed by M. Quetton to com- memorate the fact that he had first set foot on English ground on St. George's day. On proceeding to Canada, he, in conjunction with Jean Louis, Vicomte de Chalfls, and other distinguished tmigrls, acquired a large estate in wild lands in the rough region north of York, known as the " Oak Ridges.'' Finding it difficult, hov^'ever, to turn such property speedily to account, he had recourse to trade with the Indians and remote in- habitants. Numerous stations, with this object in view, were es- tablished by him in different parts of the country, before his final settlement in York. One of these posts was at Orillia, on Lake Couchiching ; and in the Niagara Herald oi h.\x%\}i%'i the 7th, 1802, we meet with the following advertisement : — " New Store at the House of the French General, between Niagara and Queenston. Messrs. Quetton St. George and Co., acquaint the public that they have lately arrived from New York with a general assortment of Dry Goods and Groceries, which will be sold at the lowest price for ready money, for from the uncertainty of their residing any time in these parts they cannot open accounts with any person. Will § 14-] King Street, from George to Caroline Sts. 189 also be found at the same store a general assortment of tools for all mechanics. They have likewise well-made Trunks ; also empty Barrels. Niagara, July 23." The copartnership implied was with M. de Farcy. The French General referred to was the Comte de Puisaye, of whom in full hereafter. The house spoken of still exists, beautifully situated at a point on the Niagara River, where the carriage-road between Queenston and the town of Niagara approaches the very brink of the lofty bank, whose precipitous side is even yet richly clothed with fine forest trees, and where the noble stream below, closed in towards the south by the heights above Lewiston and Queenston, possesses all the features of a picturesque inland lake. Attached to the house in question is a curious old fire-proof structure of brick, quaintly buttressed with stone : the walls are of a thickness of three or four feet ; and the interior is beautifully vaulted and divided into two compartments, having no communi- cation with each other : and above the whole is a long loft of wood, approached by steps on the outside. The property here belonged for a time in later years to Shickluna, the shipbuilder of St. Catha- rines, who happily did not disturb the interesting relic just de- scribed. The house itself was in some respects modernized by him ; but, with its steep roof and three dormer windows, it still retains much of its primitive character. In 1805 we find Mr. St. George removed to York. The co- partnership with M. de Farcy is now dissolved. In successive numbers of the Gazette and Oracle, issued in that and the following year, he advertises at great length. But on the 20th of Septem- ber, 1806, he abruptly announces that he is not going to advertise any more : he now once for all, begs the public to examine his former advertisements, where they will find, he says, an account of the supply which he brings from New York every spring, a similar assortment to which he intends always to have on hand : and N. B., he adds : Nearly the same assortment may be found at Mr. Boiton's, at Kingston, and at Mr. Boucherville's, at Amherstburgh, " who transact business for Mr. St. George." IMPORTS AT YORK IN 1805. As we have, in the advertisements referred to, a rather minute record of articles and things procurable and held likely to be wanted by the founders of society in these parts, we will give, for the 190 Toronto of Old. [§ 14. reader's entertainment, a selection from several of them, adhering for the most part to the order in which the goods are therein named. From time to time it is announced by Mr. St. George that there have " just arrived from New York " : — Ribbons, cotton goods, silk tassels, goWn-trimmings, cotton binding, wire trimmings, silk belting, fans, beaded buttons, block tin, glove ties, cotton bed-line, bed-lace, rollo-bands, ostrich feathers, silk lace, black veil lace, thread do., laces and edging, fine black veils, white do., fine silk mitts, love-handkerchiefs, Barcelona do., silk do., black crape, black mode, black Belong, blue, white and yellow do., striped silk for gowns, Chambray muslins, printed dimity, split-straw bonnets, Leghorn do., imperial chip do., best London Ladies' beaver bon- nets, cotton wire, Rutland gauze, band boxes, cambrics, calicoes, Irish linens, callimancoes, plain muslins, laced muslins, blue, black and yellow nankeens, jeans, fustians, long silk gloves, velvet rib- bons, Russia sheetings, India satins, silk and cotton umbrellas, parasols, white cottons, bombazetts, black and white silk stockings, damask table cloths, napkins, cotton, striped nankeens, bandana handkerchiefs, catgut, Tickenburg, brown holland, Creas k la Mor- laix, Italian lutestring, beaver caps for children. Then we have : Hyson tea. Hyson Chaulon in small chests, young Hyson, green. Souchong and Bohea, loaf. East India and Musco- vado sugars, mustard, essence of mustard, pills of mustard, capers, lemourjuice, soap, Windsor do., indigo, mace, nutmegs, cinnamon, cassia, cloves, pimento, pepper, best box raisins, prunes, coifee, Spanish and American " segars," Cayenne pepper in bottles, pearl barley, castor oil, British oil, pickled oysters. Furthermore, china-ware is to be had in small boxes and in sets ; also, Suwarrow boots, bootees, and an assortment of men's, women's and children's shoes, japanned quart mugs, do. tumblers, tipped flutes, violin bows, brass wire, sickles, iron candlesticks, shoe- makers' hammers, knives, pincers, pegging awls and tacks, awl- blades, shoe-brushes, copper tea-kettles, snaffle-bits, leather shot belts, horn powder flasks, ivory, horn and crooked combs, mathe- matical instruments, knives and forks, suspenders, fish-hooks, sleeve-Hnks, sportsmen's knives, lockets, earrings, gold topaz, do., gold watch-chains, gold seals, gold brooches, cut gold rings, plain do., pearl do., silver thimbles, do. teaspoons, shell sleeve buttons, silver watches, beads. In stationery there was to be had paste- § 14.] King Street Jr am George to Caroline Sts. tgi board, foolscap paper, second do., letter paper, black and red ink powder and wafers. There was also the following supply of Literature : — Telemachus, Volney's Views, Public Characters, Dr. Whitman's Egypt, Evelina, Cecilia, Lady's Library, Ready Reckoner, Looking Glass, Frank- lin's Fair Sex, Camilla, Don Raphael, Night Thoughts, Winter Evenings, Voltaire's Life, Joseph Andrews, Walker's Geography, Bonaparte and the French People, Voltaire's Tales, Fisher's Com- panion, Modern Literature, Eccentric Biography, Naval do.. Mar- tial do.. Fun, Criminal Records, En tick's Dictionary, Gordon's America, Thompson's Family Physician, Sheridan's Dictionary, Johnson's do., Wilson's Egypt, Denon's Travels, Travels of Cyrus, Stephani de Bourbon, Alexis, Pocket Library, Every Man's Phy- sician, Citizen of the World, Taplin's Farriery, Farmer's Boy, Romance of the Forest, Grandison, Campbell's Narrative, Paul and Virginia, Adelaide de Sincere, Emelini, Monk, Abbess, Even- ing Amusement, Children of the Abbey, Tom Jones, Vicar of Wakefield, Sterne's Journey, Abelard and Eloisa, Ormond, Caro- line, Mercutio, Julia and Baron, Minstrel, H. Villars, De Valcourt, J. Smith, Charlotte Temple, Theodore Chypon, What has Been, Elegant Extracts in Prose and Verse, J. and J. Jessamy, Chinese Tales, New Gazetteer, Smollett's Works, Cabinet of Knowledge, Devil on Sticks, Arabian Tales, Goldsmith's Essays, Bragg's Cookery, Tooke's Pantheon, Boyle's Voyage, Roderick Random, Jonathan Wild, Louisa Solomon's Guide to Health, Spelling-books, Bibles and Primers. Our extracts have extended to a great length : but the animated picture of Upper Canadian life at a primitive era, which such an enumeration of items, in some sort affords, must be our apology. In the Gazette of July 4, 1807, Mr. St. George complains of a protested bill ; but consoles himself with a quotation — Celui qui met un frein k la fureur des flots, Sait aussi des m^chants arrgter des complots. Rendered rich in money and lands by his extemporized mer- cantile operations, Mr. St. George returned to his native France soon after the restoration of Louis XVIII., and passed the rest of his days pardy in Paris and partly on estates in the neighbourhood of Montpellier. During his stay in Canada he formed a close friendship with the Baldwins of York ; and on his departure, the house on King Street, which has given rise to these reminiscences 192 Toronto of Old. [§ 14. of him, together with the valuable commercial interests connected with it, passed into the hands of a junior member of that family, Mr. John Spread Baldwin, who himself, on the same spot, subse- quently laid the foundation of an ample fortune. (It is a phenomenon not uninteresting to the retrospective mind, to observe, in 1869, after the lapse of half a century, the name of Quetton St. George reappearing in the field of Canadian Com- merce.) Advancing now on our way eastward, we soon came in front of the abode of Dr. Burnside, a New-England medical man of tall figure, upright carriage, and bluff, benevolent countenance, an early promoter of the Mechanics'-Institute movement, and an encou- rager of church-music, vocal and instrumental. Dying without a family dependent on him, he bequeathed his property partly to Charities in the town, and partly to the University of Trinity Col- lege, where two scholarships perpetuate his memory. Just opposite was the residence of the venerable Mrs. Gamble, widow of Dr. Gamble, formerly a surgeon attached to the Queen's Rangers. This lady died in 1859, in her 92nd year, leaving living descendants to the number of two hundred and four. To the west of this house was a well-remembered little parterre, always at the proper season gay with flowers. At the next corner, on the north side, a house now totally de- molished, was the original home of the millionaire Cawthra family, already once alluded to. In the Gazette and Oracle of June 21, 1806, Mr. Cawthra, senior, thus advertises : — "J. Cawthra wishes to inform the inhabitants of York and the adjacent country, that he has opened an Apothecary Store in the house of A. Cameron, opposite Stoyell's Tavern in York, where the Public can be sup- plied with most articles in that line. He has on hand also, a quan- tity of Men's, Women's, and Children's shoes and Mens' hats. Also for a few days will be sold the following articles, Table Knives and Forks, Scissors, Silver Watches, Maps and Prints, Profiles, some Linen, and a few Bed-Ticks, Teas, Tobacco, a few casks of fourth proof Cognac Brandy, and a small quantity of Lime Juice, and about twenty thousand Whitechapel Needles. York, June 14, 1806." And again, on the 27th of the following November, he informs the inhabitants of York and the neighbouring country that he had just arrived from New York with a general assortment of " apothecary articles ;" and that the public can be supplied with everything in § 1 4-] King Street^ from George to Caroline Sts. 193 that line genuine : also patent medicines : he likewise intimates that he has brought a general assortment of Dry Goods, consisting of " broad cloths, duffils, flannels, swansdown, corduroys, printed calicoes, ginghams, cambrick muslins, shirting, muslin, men and women's stockings, silk handkerchiefs, bandana shawls, pulicat and pocket handkerchiefs, calimancoes, dimity and check ; also a large assortment of men's, women's, and children's shoes, hardware, coffee, tea and chocolate, lump and loaf sugar, tobacco, &c., with many other articles : which he is determined to sell on very low terms at his store opposite Stoyell's tavern. York, Nov. 27, 1806. (The Stoyell's Tavern here named, had previously been the Inn of Mr. Abner Miles.) Immediately across, at the comer on the south side, was a depdt, insignificant enough, no doubt, to the indifferent passer-by, but in- vested with much importance in the eyes of many of the early infantiles of York. Its windows exhibited, in addition to a scat- tering of white clay pipes, and papers of pins suspended open against the panes for the public inspection, a display of circular discs of gingerbread, some with plain, some with scalloped edge ; also hearts, fishes,, little prancing ponies, parrots and dogs of the same tawny-hued material ; also endwise in tumblers and other glass vessels, numerous lengths or stems of prepared saccharine matter, brittle in substance, white-looking, but streaked and slightly penetrated with some rich crimson pigment; likewise on plates and oval dishes, a collection of quadrangular viscous lumps, buff- coloured and clammy, each showing at its ends the bold gashing cut of a stout knife which must have been used in dividing a rope, as it were, of the tenacious substance into inch-sections or parts. In the wrapping paper about all articles purchased here, there was always a soup9on of the homely odors of boiled sugar and peppermint. The tariff of the various comestibles just enumerated was well known ; it was precisely for each severally, one half-penny. The mistress of this establishment bore the Scottish name of Lums- den — a name familiar to us lads in another way also, being con- stantly seen by us on the title-pages of school-books, many of which, at the time referred to, were imported from Glasgow, from the publishing-house of Lumsden and Son. A little way down the street which crosses here, was Major Reward's house, long Clerk of the Peace for the Home District, of whom we had occasion to speak before. Several of his sons, M 194 Toronto of Old. [§ ^4 while pursuing their legal and other studies, became also " mightjr hunters ;" distinguished, we mean, as enthusiastic sportsmen. Many- were the exploits reported of them, in this line. We give here an extract from Mr. McGrath's lively work, pub- lished in 1833, entitled " Authentic letters from Upper Canada, with an Account of Canadian Field Sports." " Ireland," he says, " is, in many places, remarkable for excellent cock-shooting, which I have myself experienced in the most favourable situations : not, however, to be compared with this country, where the numbers are truly wonderful. Were I to mention,'' Mr. McGrath Con- tinues, " what I have seen in this respect, or heard from others, it might bring my graver statements into disrepute." " As a specimen of the sport," he says, " I will merely give a fact or two of, not unusual success ; bearing, however, no propor- tion to the quantity of game. I have known Mr. Charles Heward, of York," he proceeds to state, " to have shot in one day thirty brace at Chippewa, close to the Falls of Niagara — and I myself," Mr. McGrath continues, " who am far from being a first-rate shot, have frequently brought home from twelve to fourteen brace, my brothers performing their part with equal success." But the younger Messrs. Heward had a field for the exercise of their sportsman skill nearer home than Chippewa. The Island, just acioss the Bay, where the black-heart plover were said always to arrive on a particular day, the 23rd of May, every year, and the marshes about Ashbridge's bay and York harbour itself, all abounded with wild fowl. Here, loons of a magnificent size used to be seen and heard ; and vast flocks of wild geese, passing and re-passing, high in air, in their periodical migrations. The wild swan, too, was an occasional frequenter of the ponds of the Island. XV. KING STREET, FROM CAROLINE STREET TO BERKELEY STREET. ETURNING again to King Street : At the comer of Caroline Street, diagonally across from the Cawthra homestead, was the abode, when ashore, of Captain Gates, commander of the Duke of Richmond sloop, the fashionable packet plying between Niagara and York. Mr. Gates was nearly connected with the family of Presi- dent Russell, but curiously obtained no share in the broad acres which were, in the early day, so plentifully distributed to all comers. By being unluckily out of the way, too, at a critical moment, sub- sequently, he missed a bequest at the hands of the sole inheritor of the possessions of his relative. Capt. Gates was a man of dignified bearing, of more than the ordinary height. He had seen service on the ocean as master and owner of a merchantman. His portrait, which is still preserved in Toronto, somewhat resembles that of George IV. A spot passed, a few moments since, on King Street, is associ- ated with a story in which the Richmond sloop comes up. It happened that the nuptials of a neighbouring merchant had lately taken place. Some youths, employed in an adjoining warehouse or law-office, took it into their heads that a feu dejoie should be fired on the occasion. To carry out the idea they proceeded, under cover of the night, to the Richmond sloop, where she lay frozen in by the Frederick Street wharf, and removed from her deck, without asking leave, a small piece of ordnance with which she was pro- vided. They convey it with some difficulty, carriage and all, up into King Street, and place it in front of the bridegroom's house j 1 96 Toronto of Old. [§ 1 5, run it back, as we have understood, even into the recess under- neath the double steps of the porch : when duly ensconced there, as within the port of a man-of-war, they contrived to fire it off, de- camping, however, immediately after the exploit, and leaving behind them the source of the deafening explosion. On the morrow the cannon is missed from the sloop (she was being prepared for the spring navigation) : on instituting an inquiry, Capt. Gates is mysteriously informed the lost article is, by some means, up somewhere on the premises of Mr. J. S. Baldwin, the gentleman who had been honoured with the salute, and that if he desired to recover his property he must despatch some men thither to fetch it. (We shall have occasion to refer hereafter to the Jitck- mondfY/hexi we come to speak of the early Marine of York Harbour.) Passing on our way eastward we came immediately, on the north side, to one of the principal hotels of York, a long, white,'two- storey wooden building. It was called the Mansion House — an appropriate name for an inn, when we understand " Mansion" in its proper, but somewhat forgotten sense, as indicating a temporary abode, a place which a man occupies and then relinquishes to a successor. The landlord here for a considerable time was Mr. De Forest, an American who, in some way or other, had been de- prived of his ears. The defect, however, was hardly perceptible, so nicely managed was the hair. On the ridge of the Mansion House roof was to be seen for a number of years a large and beau- tiful model of a completely-equipped sailing vessel. We then arrived at the north-west angle of King and Princes streets, were a second public well (we have already commemorated the first,) was sunk, and provided with a pump in 1824 — for all which the sum of ^36 i-js. 6d. was paid to John James on the 19th of August in that year. In the advertisements and contracts, connected with this now obhterated public convenience, Princes- Street is correctly printed and written as it here meets the eye, and not " Princess Street," as the recent corruption is. Let not the record of our early water-works be disdained. Those of the metropolis of the Empire were once on a humble scale. Thus Master John Stow, in his Survey of London, Anno 1598, re- cordeth that " at the meeting of the corners of the Old June, Milke Street, Lad Lane, Aldermanburie, there was of old time a fair well with two buckets; of late years," he somewhat pathetically adds, " converted to a pump. § 1 5. J King Streetjrom Caroline to (Berkeley Sis. 197 Just across eastward from the pump was one of the first build- ings put up on King Street : it was erected by Mr. Smith, who was the first to take up a building lot, after the ,laying-out of the town-plot. On the opposite side, a few steps further on, was Jordan's — the far-famed " York Hotel" — at a certain period, the hotel /ar excel- lence of the place, than which no better could be found at the time in all Upper Canada. The whole edifice has now utterly disap- peared. Its foundations giving way, it for a while seemed to be sinking into the earth, and then it partially threatened to topple over into the street. It was of antique style when compared with the Mansion House. It was only a storey-and-a-half high. Along its roof was a row of dormer windows. (Specimens of this style of hotel may still be seen in the country-towns of Lower Canada.) When looking in later times at the doorways and windows of the older buildings intended for public and domestic purposes, as also at the dimensions of rooms and the proximity of the ceilings to the floors, we might be led for a moment to imagine that the gene- ration of settlers passed away must have been of smaller bulk and stature than their descendants. But points especially studied in the construction of early Canadian houses, in both Provinces, were warmth and comfort in the long winters. Sanitary principles were not much thought of, and happily did not require to be much thought of, when most persons passed more of their time in the pure outer air than they do now. Jordan's York Hotel answered every purpose very well. Mem- bers of Parliament and other visitors ■ considered themselves in luxurious quarters when housed there. Probably in no instance have the public dinners or fashionable assemblies of a later era :gone off with more eclat, or given more satisfaction to the persons concerned in them, than did those which from time to time, in every season, took place in what would now be considered the very diminutive ball-room and dining-hall of Jordan's. In the ball-room here, before the completion of the brick build- ing which replaced the Legislative Halls destroyed by the Ameri- cans in 1813, the Parliament of Upper Canada sat for one session. In the rear of Jordan's, detached from the rest of the buildings, there long stood a solid circular structure of brick, of considerable height and diameter, dome-shaped without and vaulted within, somewhat resembling the furnace into which Robert, the huntsman, 198 Toronto of Old. [§ 15. is being thrast, in Retzsch's illustration of Fridolin. This was the- public oven of Paul Marian, a native Frenchman who had a bakery here before the surrounding premises were converted into a hotel by Mr. Jordan. In the Gazette of May 19, 1804, Paul Marian informs his friends and the public "that he will supply them with bread at their dwellings, at the rate of nine loaves for a dollar, on paying ready money." About the same period, another Frenchman, Francois Belcour, is exercising the same craft in York. In Gazettes of 1803, he an- nounces that he is prepared " to supply the ladies and gentlemen who may be pleased to favor him with their custom, with bread, cakes, buns, etc. And that for the convenience of small families, he will make his bread of different sizes, viz., loaves of two, three, and four pounds' weight, and will deliver the same at the houses, if required." He adds that " families who may wish to have beef, etc., baked, will please send it to the bake-house." In 1804, he offers to bake " at the rate of pound for pound ; that is to say he will return one pound of Bread for every pound of Flour which may be sent to him for the purpose of being baked into bread." After the abandonment of Jordan's as a hotel, Paul Marian's oven, repaired and somewhat extended, again did good service. In it was baked a goodly proportion of the supplies of bread furnished in 1838-9, to the troops, and incorporated militia at Toronto, by Mr. Jackes and Mr. Reynolds. As the sidewalks of King Street were apt to partake, in bad weather, of the impassableness of the streets generally at such a time, an early effort was made to have some of them paved. Some yards of foot-path, accordingly, about Jordan's, and here and there elsewhere, were covered with flat flagstones from the lake-beach, of very irregular shapes and of no great size : the effect produced was that of a very coarse, and soon a very vmeven mosaic. At Quebec, in the neighborhood of the Court House, there is retained some pavement of the kind now described : and in the early lithograph of Court House Square, at York, a long stretch of sidewalk is given in the foreground, seamed over curiously, like the surface of an old Cyclopean or Pelasgic wall. On April the 26th, 1823, it was ordered by the magistrates at Quarter Sessions that ";^ioo from the Town and Police Fund, to- gether with one-fourth of the Statute Labour within the Town, be appropriated to flagging the sidewalks of King Street, commencing; § 15-] King Street, from Caroline to (Berkeley Sts. 199 from the corner of Church Street and proceeding east to the limits of the Town, and that both sides of the street do proceed at the same time." One hundred pounds would not go very far in such an undertaking. We do not think the sidewalks of the primitive King Street were ever paved throughout their whole length with stone. After Jordan's came Dr. Widmer's surgery, associated with many a pain and ache in the minds of the early people of York, and scene of the performance upon their persons of many a deli- cate, and daring, and successful remedial experiment. Nearly op- posite was property appertaining to Dr. Stoyell, an immigrant, non-practising medical man from the United States, with Republi- can proclivities as it used to be thought, who, previous to his purchasing here, conducted, as has been already implied, an inn at Mrs. Lumsden's comer. (The house on the other side of Ontario Street, westward, was Hayes' Boarding House, noticeable simply as being in session-time, like Jordan's, the temporary abode of many Members of Parliament.) After Dr. Widmer's, towards the termination of King Street, on the south side, was Mr. Small's, originally one of the usual low- looking domiciles of the country, with central portion and two gable wings, somewhat after the fashion of many an old country manor-house in England. The material of Mr. Small's dwelling was hewn timber. It was one of the earliest domestic erections in York. When re-con- structed at a subsequent period, Mr. Charles Small preserved, in the enlarged and elevated building, now known as Berkeley House, the shape and even a portion of the inner substance of the original structure. We have before us a curious plan (undated but old) of the piece of ground originally occupied and enclosed by Mr. Small, as a . yard and garden round his primitive homestead : occupied and enclosed, as it would seem, before any build- ing lots were set off by authority on the Government re- reserve or common here. The plan referred to is entitled "A sketch showing the land occupied by John Small, Esq., upon the Reserve appropriated for the Government House at York by His Excellency Lt. Gov. Simcoe." An irregular oblong, coloured red, is bounded on the north side by King Street, and is lettered with- in — " Mr. Small's Improvements." Round the irregular piece 200 Toronto of Old. [§ 15. thus shewn, lines are drawn enclosing additional space, and bring- ing the whole into the shape of a parallelogram : the parts outside the irregularly shaped red portion, are colored yellow : and on the yellow, the memorandum appears — "This added would make an Acre." The block thus brought into shapely form is about one- half of the piece of ground that at present appertains to Berkeley House. The plan before us also incidentally shows where the Town of York was supposed to terminate ; — an inscription — " Front Line of the Town " — runs along the following route .• up what is now the lane through Dr. Widmer's property : and then, at a right angle eastward along what is now the north boundary of King Street opposite the block which it was necessary to get into shape round Mr. Small's first " Improvements." King Street proper, in this plan, terminates at " Ontario Street :" from the eastern limit of Ontario Street, the continuation of the highway is marked " Road to Quebec," — with an arrow shewing the direction in which the traveller must keep his horse's head, if he would reach that ancient city. — The arrow at the end of the inscription just given points slightly upwards, indicating the fact that the said " Road to Que- bec" trends slightly to the north after leaving Mr. Small's clearing. XVI. FROM BERKELEY STREET TO THE BRIDGE AND ACROSS IT. JE now propose to pass rapidly down " the road to Quebec " as far as the Bridge. First we cross, in the hollow, Goodwin's creek, the stream which en- ters the Bay by the cut-stone Jail. Lieutenant Givins (afterwards Colonel Givins), on the occasion of his first visit to Toronto in 1793, forced his way in a canoe with a friend up several of the meanderings of this stream, under the impression that he was exploring the Don. He had heard that a river leading to the North- West entered the Bay of Toronto, somewhere near its head ; and he mistook the lesser for the greater stream : thus on a small scale performing the exploit accomplished by several of the explorers of the North American coast, who, under the firm persuasion that a water high- way to Japan and China existed somewhere across this continent, lighted upon Baffin's Bay, Davis Strait, the Hudson River, and the St. Lawrence itself, in the course of their investigations. On the knoll to the right, after crossing Goodwin's creek, was Isaac Pilkington's lowly abode, a little group of white buildings in a grove of pines and acacias. Parliament Street, which enters near here from the north, is a memorial of the olden time, when, as we have seen, the Parliament Buildings of Upper Canada were situated in this neighbourhood. In an early section of these Recollections we observed that what is now called Berkeley Street was originally Parliament Street, a name which, like that borne by a well-known thoroughfare in Westmin- ster, for a similar reason, indicated the fact that it led down to the Houses of Parliament. 202 Toronto of Old. [§ 1 6. The road that at present bears the name of Parliament Street shews the direction of the track through the primitive woods opened by Governor Simcoe to his summer house on the Don, called Castle-Frank, of which fully, in its place hereafter. Looking up Parliament Street we are reminded that a few yards westward from where Duke Street enters it, lived at an early period Mr. Richard Coates, an estimable and ingenious man, whose name is associated in our memory with the early dawn of the fine arts in York. Mr. Coates, in a self-taught way, executed, not unsuccess- fully, portraits in oil of some of our ancient worthies. Among ihings of a general or historical character, he painted also for David Willson, the founder of the "Children of Peace," the sym- bolical decorations of the interior of the Temple at Sharon. He cultivated music likewise, vocal and instrumental ; he built an organ of some pretensions, in his own house, on which he per- formed ; he built another for David Willson at Sharon. Mr. Coates constructed, besides, in the yard of his house, an elegantly-finished little pleasure yacht, of about nine tons burden. This passing reference to infant Art in York recalls again the name of Mr. John Craig, who has before been mentioned in our account of the interior of one of the many successive St. Jameses. Although Mr. Craig did not himself profess to go beyond his sphere as a decorative and heraldic painter, the spirit that animated him really tended to foster in the community a taste for art in a wider sense. Mr. Charles Daly, also, as a skilful teacher of drawing in water- colours and introducer of superior specimens, did much to en- courage art at an early date. In 1834 we find Mr. Daly promoting an exhibition of Paintings by the " York Artists and Amateur Association," and acting as " Honorary Secretary," when the Exhi- bition for the year took place. Mr. James Hamilton, a teller in the bank, produced, too, some noticeable landscapes in oil. As an auxiliary in the cause, and one regardful of the wants of artists at an early period, we name, likewise, Mr. Alexander Ham- ilton ; who, in addition to s^ipplying materials in the form of pig- ments and prepared colours, contributed to the tasteful setting off of the productions of pencil and brush, by furnishing them with ft-ames artistically carved and gilt. Out of the small beginnings and rudiments of Art at York, one artist of a genuine stamp was, in the lapse of a few years, develop- § 1 6.J (Berkeley Street to the (Bridge and across it. 203, ed— Mr. Paul Kane ; who, after studying in the schools of Europe, returned to Canada and made the illustration of Indian character and life his specialty. By talent exhibited in this class of pictorial delineation, he acquired a distinguished reputation throughout the North American continent; and by his volume of beautifully illus- trated travels, published in London, and entitled " Wanderings of an Artist among the Indians of North America," he obtained for himself a recognized place in the literature of British Art. In the hollow, a short distance westward of Mr. Coates's, was one of the first buildings of any size ever erected in these parts wholly of stone. It was put up by Mr. Hutchinson. It was a large square family house of three storeys. It still exists, but its material is hidden under a coating of stucco. Another building, wholly of stone, was Mr. Hunter's house, on the west side of Church Street. A portion of Hugill's Brewery likewise exhibited walls of the same solid, English-looking substance. We now resume our route. We immediately approach another road entering from the north, which again draws us aside. This opening led up to the only Roman Catholic church in York, an edifice of red-brick, substan- tially built. Mr. Ewart was the contractor. The material of the north and south walls was worked into a kind of tesselated pat- tern, which was considered something very extraordinary. The spire was originally surmounted by a large and spirited effigy of the bird that admonished St. Peter, and not by a cross. It was not a flat, moveable weathercock, but a fixed, solid figure, covered with tin. In this building officiated for some time an ecclesiastic named O'Grady. Mingling with a crowd, in the over-curious spirit of boy- hood, we here, at funerals and on other occasions, first witnessed the ceremonial forms observed by Roman Catholics in their wor- ship ; and once we remember being startled at receiving, by design or accident, from an overcharged aspergillum in the hands of a zealous ministrant of some grade passing down the aisle, a copious, splash of holy water in the eye. Functionaries of this denomination are generally remarkable for their quiet discharge of duty and for their apparent submissiveness to authority. They sometimes pass and repass for years before the indifferent gaze of multitudes holding another creed, without exciting any curiosity even as to their personal names. But Mr. 204 Toronto of Old. [§ ^6. O'Grady was an exception to the general run of his order. He acquired a distinctive reputation among outsiders. He was un- derstood to be an unruly presbyter; and through his instrumentality, letters of his bishop, evidently never intended to meet the public eye, got into general circulation. He was required to give an ac- count of himself, subsequently, at the feet of the "Supreme Pontiff." Power Street, the name now applied to the road which led up to the Roman Catholic church, preserves the name of the Bishop of this communion, who sacrificed his life in attending to the sick «migrants in 1847. The road to the south, a few steps further on, led to the wind- mill built by Mr. Worts, senior, in 1832. In the possession of Messrs. Gooderham & Worts are three interesting pictures, in oil, which from time to time have been exhibited. They are intended to illustrate the gradual progress in extent and importance of the mills and manufactures at the site of the wind-mill. The first shows the original structure — a circular tower of red brick, with the usual sweeps attached to a hemispherical revolving top ; in the distance town and harbour are seen. The second shows the wind- mill dismantled, but surrounded by extensive buildings of brick and wood, sheltering now elaborate machinery driven by steam power. The third represents a third stage in the march of enter- prise and prosperity. In this picture gigantic structures of massive, dark-coloured stone tower up before the eye, vying in colossal pro- portions and ponderous strength with the works of the castle- builders of the feudal times. Accompan)dng these interesting landscape views, all of them by Forbes, a local artist of note, a group of life-size portraits in oil, has occasionally been seen at Art Exhibitions in Toronto — Mr. Gooderham, senior, and his Seven Sons — all of them well-developed, sensible-looking, substantial men, manifestly capable of undertaking and executing whatever practical work the exigencies of a young and vigorous community may require to be done. Whenever we have chanced to obtain a glimpse of this striking group (especially the miniature photographic reproduction of it on one card), a picture of Tancred of Hauteville and his Twelve Sons, " all of them brave and fair,'' once familiar as an illustration ap- pended to that hero's story, has always recurred to us ; and we have thought how thankfully should 'we regard the grounds on which the modern Colonial patriarch comforts himself in view of a § i6.] Berkeley Street to the (Bridge and across it. 205 numerous family springing up around him, as contrasted with the reasons on account of which the enterprising Chieftain of old con- gratulated himself on the same spectacle. The latter beheld in his ring of stalwart sons so many warriors ; so much good solid stufl" to be freely offered at the shrine of his own glory, or the glory of his feudal lord, whenever the occasion should arise. The former, in the young men and maidens, peopling his house, sees so many additional hands adapted to aid in a bloodless conquest of a huge continent ; so much more power evolved, and all of it in due time sure to be wanted, exactly suited to assist in pushing forward one stage further the civilizing, humanizing, beautifying, processes al- ready, in a variety of directions, initiated. " Peace hath her victories, No less renowned than war ;'' and it is to the victories of peace chiefly that the colonial father expects his children to contribute. When the families of Mr. Gooderham and Mr. Worts crossed the Atlantic, on the occasion of their emigration from England, the party, all in one vessel, comprised, as we are informed, so many as fifty-four persons more or less connected by blood or marriage. We have been told by Mr. James Beaty that when out duck shooring, now nearly forty years since, he was surprised by falling in with Mr. Worts, senior, rambling apparently without purpose in the bush at the mouth of the Little Don : all the surrounding locality was then in a state of nature, and frequented only by the sportsman or trapper. On entering into conversation with Mr. Worts, Mr. Beaty found that he was there prospecting for an ob- ject ; that, in fact, somewhere near the spot where they were standing, he thought of putting up a wind-mill! The project at the time seemed sufficiently Quixotic. But posterity beholds the large practical outcome of the idea then brooding in Mr. Worts's brairi. In their day of small things the pioneers of new settle- ments may take courage from this instance of progress in one gen- eration, from the rough to the most advanced condition. For a century to come, there will be bits of this continent as unpromis- ing, at the first glance, as the mouth of the Little Don, forty years ago, yet as capable of being reclaimed by the energy and ingenuity of man, and being put to divinely-intended and legitimate uses. — Returning now from the wind-mill, once more to the "road to 2o6 Toronto of Old. [§ i6. Quebec," in common language, the Kingston road, we passed, at the comer, the abode of one of the many early settlers in these parts who bore German names — the tenement of Peter Ernst, or Ernest as the appellation afterwards became. From these Collections and Recollections matters of compara- tively so recent a date as 1849 have for the most part been ex- cluded. We make an exception in passing the Church which gives name to Trinity Street, for the sake of recording an inscription on one of its interior walls. It reads as follows : — " To the Memory of the Reverend William Honywood Ripley, B.A., of University College, Oxford, First Incumbent of this Church, son of the Rev. Thomas Hyde Ripley, Rector of Tockenham, and Vicar of Woot- ton Bassett in the County of Wilts, England. Atter devoting him- self during the six years of his ministry, freely, without money and without price, to the advancement of the spiritual and temporal welfare of this congregation and neighbourhood, and to the great increase amongst them of the knowledge of Christ and His Church, he fell asleep in Jesus on Monday the 2 2nd of October, 1849, aged 34 years. He filled at the same time the office of Honorary Sec- retary to the Church Society of the Diocese of Toronto, and was Second Classical Master of Upper Canada College. This Tablet is erected by the Parishioners of this Church as a tribute of heart- felt respect and affection. Remember them that have the rule over you, who have spoken unto you the Word of God : whose faith follow, considering the end of their conversation." Canadian society in all its strata has been more or less leavened from England. One of the modes by which the process has been •carried on is revealed in the inscription just given. In 1849, while this quarter of Toronto was being taken up and built over, the in- fluence of the clergyman commemorated was singularly marked within it. Mr. Ripley, in his boyhood, had been trained under Dr. Arnold, at Rugby ; and his father had been at an early period, a private tutor to the Earl of Durham who came out to Canada in 1838 as High Commissioner. As to the material fabric of Trinity Church — its erection was chiefly due to the exertions of Mr. Alexander Dixon, an alderman of Toronto. The brick School-house attached to Trinity Church bears the inscription : " Erected by Enoch Turner, 1848." Mr. Turner was a benevolent Englishman who prospered in this immediate locality as a brewer, and died in 1866. Besides handsome bequests to ^ 1 6. J (Berkeley Street to the (Bridge and across it. 207 near relations, Mr. Turner left by will, to Trinity College, Toronto, ;,^2,ooo ; to Trinity Church, ^^500 ; to St. Paul's ^^250 ; to St. Peter's ;^25o. Just opposite on the left was where Angell lived, the architect of the abortive bridges over the mouths of the Don. We obtain from the York Observer of December ii, 1820, some earlier infor- mation in regard to Mr. Angell. It is in the form of a " Card" thus headed : " York Land Price Current Office, King Street." It then proceeds — " In consequence of the Increase of the popula- lation of the Town of York, and many applications for family ac- commodation upon the arrival of strangers desirous of becoming settlers, the Subscriber intends to add to the practice of his Office the business of a House Surveyor and Architect, to lay out Building Estate, draw Ground plans. Sections and £levatio9is, to order, and upon the most approved European and English customs. Also to make estimates and provide contracts with proper securities to pre- vent impostures, for the performance of the same. E. Angell. N.B. — Land proprietors having estate to dispose of, and persons requiring any branch of the above profession to be done, will meet with the most respectful attention on application by letter, or at this office. York, Oct. 2, [1820]." The expression, " York Price Current Office," above used is ex- plained by the fact that Mr. Angell commenced at this early date the publication of a monthly "Land Price Current List of Estates on Sale in Upper Canada, to be circulated in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales.'' Near Mr. Angell, on the same side, lived also Mr. Cummins, the manager of the Upper Canada Gazette printing office ; and, at a later period, Mr. Watson, another well-known master-printer of York, who lost his life during the great fire of 1849, in endeavour- ing to save a favourite press from destruction, in the third storey of a building at the corner of King and Nelson streets, a position occupied subsequently by the Caxton-press of Mr. Hill. On some of the fences along here, we remember seeing in 1827- 8, an inscription written up in chalk or white paint, memorable to ourselves personally, as being the occasion of our first taking serious notice of one of the political questions that were locally stirring the people of Upper Canada. The words inscribed were — No Aliens ! Like the Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, which we ourselves also subsequently saw painted on the walls of Paris ; 2o8 Toronto of Old. [§ i6, these words were intended at once to express and to rouse public feeling ; only in the present instance, as we suppose now, the in- scription emanated from the oligarchical rather than the popular side. The spirit of it probably was " Down with Aliens," — and not " Away with the odious distinction of Aliens ! " A dispute had arisen between the Upper and the Lower House as to the legal terms in which full civil rights should be conferred on a considerable portion of the inhabitants of the country. After the acknowledgment of independence in 1783, emigrants from the United States to the British Provinces came in no longer as British subjects, but as foreigners. Many such emigrants had acquired property and exercised the franchise without taking upon them- selves, formally, the obligations of British subjects. After the war of 18 1 2, the law in regard to this matter began to be distinctly re- membered. The desire then was to check an undue immigration from the southern side of the great lakes ; but the effect of the re- vival of the law was to throw doubt on the land titles of many in- habitants of long standing ; doubt on their claim to vote and to fill any civil office. The consent of the Crown was freely given to legislate on the subject : and in 1825-6 the Parliament resolved to settle the ques- tion. But a dispute arose between the Lower and Upper House. The Legislative Council sent down a Bill which was so amended in terms by the House of Assembly that the former body declared it then to be " at variance with the laws and estabhshed policy of Great Britain, as well as of the United States ; and therefore if passed into a law by this Legislature, would afford no relief to many of those persons who were born in the United States, and who have come into and settled in this Province." The Upper House party set down as disloyal all that expressed themselves satisfied with the Lower House amendments. It was from the Upper House party, we think, that the cry of " No Aliens !" had proceeded. The Ahen measure had been precipitated by the cases of Bar- nabas Bidwell and of his son Marshall, of whom the former, after being elected, and taking his seat as member for Lennox and Addington, had been expelled the House, on the ground of his being an alien ; and the latter had met with diflSculties at the out- set of his political career, from the same objection against him. In the case of the former, however, his alien character was not the only thing to his disadvantage. § 1 6.] Berkeley Street to the (Bridge and across it. 209 It was in connection with the expulsion of Barnabas Bidwell that Dr. Strachan gave to a member of the Lower House, when hesi- tating as to the legality of such a step, the remarkable piece ot advice, " Turn him out, turn him out ! Never mind the law !" — a dictum that passed into an adage locally, quoted usually in the Aberdeen dialect. Barnabas Bidwell is thus commemorated in Mackenzie's Almanac for 1834: "July 27, 1833: Barnabas Bidwell, Esq., Kingston, died, aged 69 years and 11 months. He was a sincere friend of the rights of the people ; possessed of extraordinary powers of mind and memory, and spent many years of his life in doing all the good he could to his fellow-creatures, and promoting the inter- ests of society.'' Irritating political questions have now, for the most part, been disposed of in Canada. We have entered into the rest, in this re- spect, secured for us by our predecessors. The very fences which, some forty years ago, were muttering " No Aliens !" we saw, during the time of a late general election, exhibiting in conspicuous painted characters, the following exhortation : " To the Electors of the Dominion — Put in Powell's Pump" — a humorous advertise- ment, of course, of a particular contrivance for raising water from the depths. We think it a sign of general peace and content, when the populace are expected to enjoy a httle jest of this sort. A small compact house, with a pleasant flower garden in front, on the left, a little way on, was occupied for a while by Mr. Joshua Beard, at the time Deputy Sheriff, but afterwards well known as owner of extensive iron works in the town. We then came opposite to the abode, on the same side, of Mr. Charles Fothergill, some time King's Printer for Upper Can- ada. He was a man of wide views and great intelligence, fond of science, and an experienced naturalist. Several folio volumes of closely written manuscript, on the birds and animals generally of of this continent, by him, must exist somewhere at this moment. They were transmitted to friends in England, as we have under- stood. We remember seeing in a work by Bewick a horned owl of this country, beautifully figured, which, as stated in the context, had been drawn from a stuffed specimen supplied by Mr. Fothergill. He himself was a skilful delineator of the living creatures that so much interested him. N 2IO Toronto of Old. [§ i6. In 1832 Mr. Fothergill sat in Parliament as member for Nor- thumberland, and for expressing some independent opinions in that capacity, he was deprived of the office of King's Printer. He originated the law which established Agricultural Societies in Upper Canada. In 1836, he appears to have been visited in Pickering by Dr. Thomas Rolph, when making notes for his " Statistical Account of Upper Canada." " The Township of Pickering," Dr. Rolph says, " is well settled and contains some fine land, and well watered. Mr. Fothergill," he continues, " has an extensive and most valu- able museum of natural curiosities at his residence in this town- ship, which he has collected with great industry and the most re- fined taste. He is a person of superior acquirements, and ardently devoted to the pursuit of natural philosophy." P. 189. It was Mr. Fothergill's misfortune to have lived too early in Upper Canada. Many plans of his in the interests of literature and science came to nothing for the want of a sufficient body of seconders. In conjunction with Dr. Dunlop and Dr. Rees, it was the intention of Mr. Fothergill to estabhsh at York a Museum of Natural and Civil History, with a Botanical and Zoological Garden attached ; and a grant of land on the Government Reserve between the Ganison and Farr's Brewery was actually secured as a site for the buildings and grounds of the proposed institution. A prospectus now before us sets forth in detail a very compre- hensive scheme for this Museum or Lyceum, which embraced also a picture gallery, "for subjects connected with Science and Por- traits of individuals," and did not omit " Indian antiquities, arms, dresses, utensils, and whatever might illustrate and make perma- nent all that we can know of the Aborigines of this great Continent, a people who are rapidly passing away and becoming as though they had never been." For several years Mr. Fothergill published " The York Almanac and Royal Calendar," which gradually became a volume of be- tween four and five hundred duodecimo pages, filled with practical and official information on the subject of Canada and the other British American Colonies. This work is still often resorted to for information. Hanging in his study we remember noticing a large engraved map of " Cabotia." It was a delineation of the British Posses- sions in North America — the present Dominion of Canada in fact. I 1 6.] (Berkeley Street to the (Bridge and across it. 211 II had been his purpose in 1823 to publish a " Canadian Annual Register ;" but this he never accomplished. While printing the Upper Canada Gazette, he edited in conjunction with that periodi- ■cal and on the same sheet, the " Weekly Register," bearing the motto, " Our endeavour will be to stamp the very body of the time — its form and pressure : we shall extenuate nothing, nor shall we . set down aught in malice." From this publication may be gathered much of the current history of the period. In it are given many curious scientific excerpts from his Common Place Book. At a later period, he published, at Toronto, a weekly paper in quarto shape, named the " Palladium." Among the non-official advertisements in the Upper Canada Gazette, in the year 1823, we observe one signed " Charles Fother- gill," offering a reward " even to the full value of the volumes," for the recovery of missing portions of several English standard works which had belonged formerly, the advertisement stated, to the " Toronto Library," broken up " by the Americans at the taking of York." It was suggested that probably the missing books were still scattered about, up and down, in the town. It is odd to see the name of " Toronto " cropping out in 1823, in connection with s. library. (In a much earlier York paper we notice the " Toronto Coffee House" advertised.) Mr. Fothergill belonged to the distinguished Quaker family of that name in Yorkshire. A rather good idea of his character of ■countenance may be derived from the portrait of Dr. Arnold, pre- fixed to Stanley's Memoir. An oil painting of him exists in the possession of some of his descendants. We observe in Leigh Hunt's London Journal, i. 172, a reference to "Fothergill's Essay on the Philosophy, Study and Use of ^Natural History ;" and we have been assured that it is our Canadian Fothergill who was its author. We give a pathetic extract from a specimen of the production, in the work just referred to : " Never shall I forget," says the essayist, " the remembrance of a Uttle in- cident which many will deem trifling and unimportant, but which has been peculiarly interesting to my heart, as giving origin to sen- timents and rules of action which have since been very dear to me." " Besides a singular elegance of form and beauty of plumage," continues the enthusiastic naturalist, "the eye of the common lapwing is peculiarly soft and expressive ; it is large, black, and full of lustre, rolUng, as it seems to do, in liquid gems of dew, I 212 Toronto of Old. [§ i^- had shot a bird of this beautiful species ; but, on taking it up, I found it was not dead. I had wounded its breast ; and some big' drops of blood stained the pure whiteness of its feathers. As I held the hapless bird in my hand, hundreds of its companions hovered round my head, uttering continued shrieks of distress, and, by their plaintive cries, appeared to bemoan the fate of one to whomi they were connected by ties of the most tender and interesting: nature ; whilst the poor wounded bird continually moaned, with a, kind of inward wailing note, expressive of the keenest anguish ; and, ever and anon, it raised its drooping head, and turning to- wards the wound in its breast, touched it with its bill, and then looked up in my face, with an expression that I have no wish tO' forget, for it had power to touch my heart whilst yet a boy, when a. thousand dry precepts in the academical closet would have beeni of no avail." The length of this extract will be pardoned for the sake of its deterrent drift in respect to the wanton maiming and massacre of our feathered fellow-creatures by the firearms of sportsmen and missiles of thoughtless children. Eastward from the house where we have been pausing, the road took a slight sweep to the south and then came back to its former course towards the Don bridge, descending in the meantime into, the valley of a creek or watercourse, and ascending again from it on the other side. Hereabout, to the left, standing on a pic- turesque knoll and surrounded by the natural woods of the region,, was a good sized two-storey dwelling ; this was the abode of Mr. David MacNab, sergeant-at-arms to the House of Assembly, as his father had been before him. With him resided several accom- plished, kind-hearted sisters, all of handsome and even stately pre- sence ; one of them the belle of the day in society at York. Here were the quarters of the Chief MacNab, whenever he came up to York from his Canadian home on the Ottawa. It was not alone when present at church that this remarkable gentleman at- tracted the public gaze ; but also, when surrounded or followed by a group of his fair kinsfolk of York, he marched with dignified steps along through the whole length of King Street, and down or up the Kingston road to and from the MacNab homestead here ia the woods near the Don. In his visits to the capital, the Chief always wore a modified highland costume, which well set off his stalwart, upright form t § 1 6.] (Berkeley Street to the ^Bridge and across it. 2 1 3 the blue bonnet and feather, and richly embossed dirk, always rendered him conspicuous, as well as the tartan of brilliant hues depending from his shoulder after obliquely swathing his capacious chest ; a bright scarlet vest with massive silver buttons, and dress coat always jauntily thrown back, added to the picturesqueness of the figure. It was always evident at a glance that the-Chief set a high value -on himself — " May the MacNab of MacNabshave the pleasure of •taking wine witli Lady Sarah Maitiand i" suddenly heard above the buzz of conversation, pronounced in a very deep and measured tone, by his manly voice, made mute for a time, on one occasion, the dinner-table at Government House. So the gossip ran. An- other story of the same class, but less likely, we should think, to be true, was, that seating himself, without uncovering, in the Court- Toom one day, a messenger was sent to him by the Chief Justice, Sir William Campbell, on the Bench, requiring the removal of his cap ; when the answer returned, as he instantly rose and left the building, was, that " the MacNab of MacNabs doffs his bonnet to no man !" At his home on the Chats the Emigrant Laird did his best to transplant the traditions and customs of by-gone days in the High- lands, but he found practical Canada an unfriendly soil for romance -and sentiment. Bouchette, in his British Dominions, i. 82, thus refers to the Canadian abode of the Chief and to the settlement formed by the clan MacNab. " High up [the Ottawa]," he says, " on the bold and abrupt shore of the broad and picturesque Lake of the Chats, the Highland Chief MacNab has selected a romantic residence, Kinnell Lodge, which he has succeeded, through the most unshaken perseverance, in rendering exceedingly comfort- able. His unexampled exertions in forming and fostering the set- tlement of the township, of which he may be considered the founder and the leader, have not been attended with all the suc- cess that was desirable, or which he anticipated." Bouchette then appends a note wherein we can see how readily his own demonstrative Gallic nature sympathized with the kindred Celtic spirit of the Highlander. " The characteristic hospitality that distinguished our reception by the gallant Chief," he says, ■"when, in 1828, we were returning down the Ottawa, after having •explored its rapids and lakes, as far up as Grand Calumet, we can- not pass over in silence. To voyageurs in the remote wilds of 214 Toronto of Old. [§ i6, Canada," he continues, " necessarily strangers for the time to the sweets of civilization, the unexpected comforts of a well-furnishedi board, and the cordiality of a Highland welcome, are blessings- that fall upon the soul like dew upon the flower. ' The sun was just resigning to the moon the empire of the skies,' when we took our leave of the noble chieftain," he adds, " to descend the formid- able rapids of the Chats. As we glided from the foot of the bold bank, the gay plaid and cap of the noble Gael were seen waving on the proud eminence, and the shrill notes of the piper filled the air with their wild cadences. They died away as we approached the head of the rapids. Our caps were flourished, and the flags (for our canoe was gaily decorated with them) waved in adieu, and we entered the vortex of the swift and whirling stream." In 1836, Rolph, in his " Statistical Account of Upper Canada," p. 146, also speaks of the site of Kinnell Lodge as " greatly re- sembling in its bold, sombre and majestic aspect, the wildest and most romatic scenery" of Scotland. " This distinguished Chief- tain," the writer then informs us, " has received permission to raise a militia corps of 800 Highlanders, a class of British subjects always- distinguished for their devoted and chivalrous attachment to the laws and institutions of their noble progenitors, and who would prove a rampart of living bodies in defence of British supremacy whenever and wherever assailed." The reference in Dean Ramsay's interesting " Reminiscences of Scottish life and Character," to " the last Laird of MacNab," is perhaps to the father of the gentleman familiar to us here in York, and who filled so large a space in the recollections of visitors to the Upper Ottawa. " The last Laird of MacNab before the clan finally broke up and emigrated to Canada was," says the Dean in the work just named, "a well-known character in the country ; and,, being poor, used to ride about on a most wretched horse, which gave occasion to many jibes at his expense. The Laird," this writer continues, " was in the constant habit of riding up fromthe country to attend the Musselburgh races [near Edinburgh]. A young wit, by way of playing him off on the race course, asked him in a contemptuous tone, " Is that the same horse you had last year, Laird?" — "Na," said the Laird, brandishing his whip in the interrogator's face in so emphatic a manner as to preclude further questioning, "Na ! but it's the same whup /" (p. 216, 9th ed.) We do not doubt but that the MacNabs have ever been a § 1 6.] (Berkeley Street to the (Bridge and across it. 2 1 5 spirited race. Their representatives here have always been such ; and like their kinsmen in the old home, too, they have had, during their brief history in Canada, their share of the hereditary vicissi- tudes. We owe to a Sheriff's advertisement in the Upper Canada Gazette or American Oracle of the T4th of April, 1798, published at Niagara, some biographical particulars and a minute description of the person of the Mr. MacNab who was afterwards, as we have already stated. Usher of the Black Rod to the House of Assembly and father of his successor, Mr. David MacNab, in the same post ; father also of the Allan MacNab, whose history forms part of that of Upper Canada. In 1 798, imprisonment for debt was the rigorously enforced law of the land. The prominent MacNab of that date had, it would appear, become obnoxious to the law on the score of indebtedness : but finding the restraint imposed irksome, he had relieved himself of it without asking leave. The hue and cry for his re-capture proceeded as follows : " Two hundred dollars reward ! Home Dis- trict, Upper Canada, Newark, April 2, 1798. Broke the gaol of this District on the night of the ist instant, [the ist of April, be it observed,] Allan MacNab, a confined debtor. He is a reduced lieutenant of horse,'' proceeds the Sheriff, " on the half-pay list of the late corps of Queen's Rangers ; aged 38 years or thereabouts ; five feet three inches high ; fair complexion ; light hair ; red beard ; much marked with the small-pox ; the middle finger of one of his hands remarkable for an overgrown nail ; round shouldered ; stoops a little in walking ; and although a native of the Highlands of Scot- land, affects much in speaking the Irish dialect. Whoever will apprehend, &c., &c., shall receive the above reward, with all rea- sonable expenses." The escape of the prisoner on the first of April was probably felt by the Sheriff to be a practical joke played off on himself person- ally. We think we detect personal spleen in the terms of the ad- vertisement : in the minuteness of the description of Mr. MacNab's physique, which never claimed to be that of an Adonis ; in the biographical particulars, which, however interesting they chance to prove to later generations, were somewhat out of place on such an occasion : as also in a postscript calling on "the printers within His Majesty's Governments in America, and those of the United States to give circulation in their respective papers to the above advertisement,'' &c. 2i6 Toronto of Old. [§ i6. It was a limited exchequer that created embarrassment in the early history — and, for that matter, in much of the later history as well — of Mr. MacNab's distinguished son, afterwards the baronet Sir Allan ; and no one could relate with more graphic and humor- ous effect his troubles from this source, than he was occasionally in the habit of doing. When observing his well-known handsome form and ever-benig- nant countenance, about the streets of York, we lads at school were wont, we remember, generally to conjecture that his ramblings were limited to certain bounds. He himself used to dwell with an amount of complacency on the skill acquired in carpentry during these intervals of involuntary leisure, and on the practical results to himself from that skill, not only in the way of pastime, but in the form of hard cash for personal necessities. Many were the panelled doors and Venetian shutters in York which, by his account, were the work of his hands. Once he was on the point of becoming a professional actor. Giving assistance now and then as an anonymous performer to Mr. Archbold, a respectable Manager here, he evinced such marked talent on the boards, that he was seriously advised to adopt the stage as his avocation and employment. The Theatre of Canadian public affairs, however, was to be the real scene of his achieve- ments. Particulars are here unnecessary. Successively sailor and soldier (and in both capacities engaged in perilous service) ; a law- yer, a legislator in both Houses ; Speaker twice in the Popular Assembly ; once Prime Minister ; knighted for gallantry, and ap- pointed an Aide-de-camp to the Queen ; dignified with a baronetcy; by the marriage of a daughter with the son of a nobleman, made the possible progenitor of English peers — the career of Allan Mac- Nab cannot fail to arrest the attention of the future investigator of Canadian history. With our local traditions in relation to the grandiose chieftain above described, one or two stories are in circulation, in which his young kinsman Allan amusingly figures. Alive to pleasantry — as so many of our early worthies in these parts were^ — he undertook, it is said, for a small wager, to prove the absolute nudity of the knees, &c., of his feudal lord when at a ball in full costume : (the allegation, mischievously made, had been that the Chief was pro- tected from the weather by invisible drawers.) The mode of de- monstration adopted was a sudden cry from the ingenuous youth § 1 6.] (Berkeley Street to the