c/?X/ 
 
 
 aVL 15 1932 
 
 CORNEL L UNIV ERSITY 
 
 ^ THE 
 
 FOUNDED BY 
 
 ROSWELL p. FLOWER 
 
 for the use of the 
 
 N. Y. State Veterinary College 
 
 1897 
 
 This Volume is the Gift of 
 
 Br,. .V,....A,..MQD.r.e.- 
 
 356 
 
My recollections of Ontario / 
 
 3 1924 001 151 590 
 
 
 DATE DUE 
 
 
 
 ^^^^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 « 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 CAVLORO 
 
 
 
 ONINTCO IN U-S.A. 
 
The original of tiiis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924001151590 
 
MY RECOLLECTIONS 
 OF ONTARIO 
 

(^J/\MA^L£iAAAJC^^^ 
 
 My Recollections 
 of Ontario 
 
 By 
 JOHN CLAY 
 
 CHICAGO 
 1918 
 
Foreword 
 
 Ihe chapters contained in this book were orig- 
 inally written for the Farmer's Magazine, pub- 
 lished in Toronto, Ontario. They were reproduced 
 in the Live Stock Report, the house organ of Clay, 
 Robinson & Company. This book, of which one 
 thousand copies have been produced, is printed 
 for private circulation and is being distributed 
 among personal friends of the writer, at home and 
 abroad. It adds something to the history of the 
 Shorthorn in America, and it portrays some of the 
 characters who acted a great part in connection 
 with those cattle about forty years ago. 
 
 The writer has had to trust to memory for 
 many of the facts, and if there are any mistakes, 
 it is to be hoped his readers will forgive them. 
 
C(^ 
 
 •ri' 
 
MY RECOLLECTIONS 
 OF ONTARIO 
 
 N THE 30th of June, 1874, I sat down in a 
 Pullman car on the 5:15 Michigan Central 
 train at the old Randolph Street depot in 
 Chicago. Opposite sat a man well on in the 
 thirties whose speech soon told he was an 
 Englishman from the Midlands. He was 
 somewhat soft-spoken, with the manners of a country 
 gentleman, just such a man as you would meet in the 
 hunting field or at market. He wore a loose tweed suit, 
 had light brown hair, and a kindly expression. As we 
 left the city and ran out into the uninteresting country 
 east of it, we naturally drifted into conversation and be- 
 fore the night was over we had exchanged confidences. 
 To us it seemed only a coincidence when he told me 
 his name — Richard Gibson of Delaware, Ontario, and 
 next morning as he got off at London it seemed good-bye, 
 not au revoir. 
 
 This was the commencement of a friendship which 
 was only closed by his death some years ago. After this 
 chance meeting it was always pleasant to meet dear old 
 Dick in the show ring, at the International, or under 
 the shadow of the Rockies when we made a trip to the 
 Colorado sheep feeding grounds. Among other qualities, 
 he had a facile pen and it ran riot when he got on old 
 days, among English villages, or simple homesteads, with 
 cows that were rich at the pail, or towering castles, for 
 
 [7] 
 
he was born under the walls of Belvoir where horse, 
 hound and huntsman went merrily forth on winter morn- 
 ings to pursue the fox. It is well that he lived in those 
 days; that the glamor hanging round, festooned by gar- 
 lands and fairy-like in its rich colors, should have guarded 
 his life from these sad scenes which to-day are written 
 deep in blood on the fields of Flanders or pierce the quiet 
 of some little thatched cottage with its latticed windows 
 and trailing roses amid English meadow lands from whence 
 father or son responded to the call of Ms country. 
 
 Although from the first days I landed in the States 
 I have felt at home, become one of the nation, yet after 
 ten weeks' traveling South and West in this my now 
 adopted country it was pleasant to return to the Domin- 
 ion of Canada to meet more especially Scotch folks. 
 Blood is thicker than water. You heard a familiar 
 tongue, the stories of youth were retold and about the 
 farms and villages there was an atmosphere of home. It 
 is a delightful run from London to St. Catharines, my 
 objective point. The farms in Oxford County, the lovely 
 view from above Dundas, the rich fruit farms of the- 
 peninsula beyond Hamilton, are all photographed in my 
 memory and even to-day, after seeing every nook and 
 corner of this continent, it is pleasant to go over this 
 beaten ground. 
 
 In the days to come it will be more or less a land of 
 romance. Guarded by Lake Erie on the south, eastwards 
 by the Niagara River, northwards by Lake Ontario, scene 
 of the Fenian raid and other historic episodes, with a 
 lovely soft climate and sheltered by hills, it will ever be 
 a beauty spot, gifted by nature to a thrifty province. 
 
 My mind often reverts to this first visit to Canada. I 
 think, outside of the people, the beauty of the foliage 
 made the greatest impression on my mind. The snake 
 fence, the blackened stumps, the log cabins fast disap- 
 
 [8] 
 
pearing, claimed your notice, but they were all dwarfed 
 in the wonderland of the woods and their mysterious 
 depths. I mentioned St. Catharines, and the reader will 
 naturally wonder why stop off there and not go ahead. 
 Shakespeare says aptly, "Though this be madness yet 
 there is method in't." Beyond this place lies Niagara 
 Falls and about the rapacity of the cabmen and other 
 harpies I had heard so much that with the proverbial 
 caution of the Scotch race I had made up my mind to 
 view the land on foot without bag or baggage, and if 
 possible avoid the traps set for the innocent tourist. 
 Further, I had a letter to a gentleman with an imposing 
 military title who had visited Scotland some years previ- 
 ously and was supposed to be a personage of great 
 influence in the province. As it happened to be Domin- 
 ion Day (1st July) I made my way to the fair grounds 
 where a great meeting was being held, a sort of picnic 
 with games, music, races and other amusements. It was 
 easy to get acquainted there and as a fresh run Scot I was 
 introduced to the mayor of the town, who was acting 
 as master of ceremonies. When I got an opportunity I 
 asked if the gentleman I expected to meet was present. 
 To this day I will never forget the sort of sniff that came 
 as an answer. No, he was not there and the above told 
 its own story. The mayor came from my county in Scot- 
 land and made it very pleasant for me, but I think for 
 some reason never discovered that letter of introduction 
 gave me more or less of a black eye in his estimation. 
 In after years when we met occasionally, I always felt 
 the presence of a black dog on my back; a burden placed 
 upon me innocently by a mutual friend. Eventually when 
 I was hospitably entertained by this party, I found him 
 what is called in the States a bit of a fore-flusher, and 
 while he took me under his roof it was a little unpleasant, 
 for his family intimated that instead of gadding about 
 
 [9] 
 
with a guest he would have been more profitably em- 
 ployed in the hay field. When out of kindness, curiosity, 
 business or a dislike to work, he accompanied me to Tor- 
 onto against the wishes of his folks, I felt more and more 
 embarrassed and when he returned to his farm it was 
 a great relief. 
 
 In those days Niagara was the Mecca of tourists. "See 
 Naples and then die" is a proverb, and so the famous 
 Falls held the same niche in the American mind, so next 
 morning, staff in hand, I entered upon the great adven- 
 ture of taking in the sights and running the gauntlet of 
 hack driver, tout and stores. A man's imagination carries 
 him a long way; visions of trouble rise up from pigmies 
 to giants and when I look back after nearly half a cen- 
 tury there was an object lesson in those illusions which 
 has been of the greatest benefit. Landing at what was 
 then the Great Western depot, I asked a man on the 
 platform the way to the Falls. He was politeness itself 
 and on a warm summer's forenoon I took the road by 
 the riverside, a sure guide being the mist rising from the 
 waters at the base of the Falls and the sullen roar that 
 broke the silence. On the way I overtook an old farmer 
 carrying the variegated cloth bag that was so common 
 in Scotland in the days of my youth. It looked home- 
 like and we struck up a conversation at once. The 
 perspiration was rolling off the old man's brow and I vol- 
 unteered to give him a hand with his load. 
 
 "I suppose you are bound for the Falls?" I said. 
 "Aye, aye, sir, I have lived for thirty years within fifty 
 miles of them and, strange to say, never saw them, so I 
 thought I would make the trip and see the eighth wonder 
 of the world." 
 
 So we strolled along, each taking a turn at the grip- 
 sack, and on the way he told me how he had migrated to 
 this country and had been fairly prosperous. Then at 
 
 [10] 
 
a turn in the road we caught sight of the Falls, saw the 
 blue waters jump into the abyss below and watched the 
 great spiral column of spray rise in majesty above the 
 river. Since then I have watched it many times, but 
 that first glimpse remains in memory steadfast, deep graven 
 there, no descendant of Old Mortality needed to decipher 
 the lettering in the granite or sandstone. 
 
 The turn in a man's fortune comes in many ways. 
 Sometimes it comes by some stray thought in the shad- 
 ows of the night; at others it is flashed across his path 
 in the vivid sunlight, but it comes to everyone. Some 
 seize opportunity, others let it slip and the best men I 
 have known have grown great not so much in riches as 
 in character, through adversity or what seemed that to 
 them at the time. This, however, is true: If a man has 
 not made a success in some way or other before he is 
 forty years of age, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred 
 he will never do much good, at least in a business way. 
 We used to talk about worthy men in Scotland. That 
 meant a very decent, respectable citizen who had never 
 done much good or evil in his life, a sort of neutral, 
 good-natured fellow who had probably made a good woman 
 a husband. Previous to visiting the States and Canada 
 I had been raised on a Scotch farm; in fact, my father 
 had several large places, lowland and hill. There you 
 lived an easy existence, a good deal of work of a kind, 
 a lot of quiet social life and a great many hours of sport- 
 ing. You learned to be an average fisherman, a good 
 shot and mostly every young man of my age and sta- 
 tion became an expert horseman and fearless rider. You 
 enjoyed what the great Jorrocks described as "the sport 
 of kings, the image of warfare, with only twenty-five per 
 cent of the danger and none of the guilt." Most of the 
 men in my class dropped into this life of ease with dig- 
 nity and there a lot of them have remained. They hunted 
 
 [llj 
 
a bit, generally got married, and if they were shrewd 
 and thrifty managed to get along as their fathers had 
 done before them. There were failures. Less than fifty 
 per cent are probably farming in the neighborhood of 
 their birth, a very few have made successes in other lines 
 of business and the balance have disappeared or gone 
 to the scrap heap. If you were in a fairly prosperous 
 condition it was a hard life to break away from. 
 
 The daily work, the evening pleasures, the sporting 
 days, coming too often for your pocket-book, the long 
 winter nights, when you could console yourself with your 
 books, the summer evenings when you went out in the 
 gloaming to commune with nature or listen to the lark's 
 requiem before she sought her downy nest. All these 
 wrapped a mystic band around your heart and bound 
 you to your native soil. For what is finer than the dew- 
 kissed meadow where morn or eve the patient cow waits 
 at the gate to be relieved of her milk, or far up on green 
 hillsides you see the white clothed ewes and lambs nib- 
 bling their way to the utmost height where when dark- 
 ness comes they will rest till "the grey-eyed morn" touches 
 the neighboring peaks with "streaks of light?" 
 
 All this and more fascinates, enthralls, binds your soul 
 and while away possibly for good I sympathize with the 
 Canadian who was told by Dr. Nojman McLeod that 
 he should be proud of his adopted country, and he 
 promptly replied something to this effect: "That's a'right, 
 Doctor, but there are nae yellow yorlings here and there 
 are nae braes like Yarrow." He would be a bold man 
 who would argue that point with a Scotchman. 
 
 There are large families on those border farms and, 
 generally speaking, the eldest son stayed at home and 
 grew up to help the father — with this disadvantage, that 
 he remained very much the boy at home and when he 
 did come into his heritage, probably at a mature age, 
 
 [12] 
 
he had only a small amount to his credit. Several 
 instances had come under my observation among our 
 neighbors, and while directly this thought did not influ- 
 ence me at the time, I made up my mind backed up by 
 my parents to see a little of the world, and as I had not 
 the money saved to go around the world, I fortunately 
 had enough to make a four months' trip in the States 
 and Canada. I had no end of letters of introduction but 
 none of any great business value; in fact, that was not 
 their intention, but a circumstance arose which changed 
 my whole life and made me eventually a trans-Atlantic 
 citizen. There is a point called St. Abb's head which 
 reaches out in bold contour into the North Sea. Near 
 there is a fine farm held by an old Scotch family. My 
 mother, who lived a few miles away, grew up with those 
 folks and just before I reached Toronto, she wrote me 
 a letter asking me to call on her old chum as a girl who 
 had married a doctor in Toronto. So out of courtesy 
 and old friendship I found the lady, who gave me a gen- 
 erous reception. More than that, her son, now a leading 
 lawyer in the above city, showed me round and among 
 other people he introduced me to the Hon. George Brown, 
 proprietor of the Toronto Globe, otherwise known as the 
 Scotchman's Bible, and also the owner of the Bow Park 
 farm near Brantford.* 
 
 Brown was an enthusiast in agriculture and we soon 
 found common ground to stand upon. After half an 
 hour's talk in which we discovered mutual acquaintances, 
 he asked me to go down the next day to Brantford (a 
 Friday) and stay over Sunday; Efnd this I did. Brown 
 at that time was at the height of his great career. He 
 
 *George Brown was bom at Alloa, Scotland, 29tli November 1818. He 
 came to New York with his father in 1838. They moved to Toronto, 
 Ontario, in 1843. He died there 10th May, 1880. Mr. Bengough, a 
 brother journalist, wrote this couplet: 
 
 "His nature was a rushing mountain stream; 
 His faults but eddies which its swiftness bred." 
 
 [13] 
 
was a tall, somewhat slender man, his gray hair still 
 tinged with red, its original color. He had strong feat- 
 ures, a prominent nose, a strong chin, with a kindly sort 
 of sleepy eye that flashed as he spoke. He had the man- 
 ners of a Chesterfield, but he was autocratic in his meth- 
 ods and unfortunately the spirit of compromise was largely 
 left out of his nature. In his home he was delightful, 
 while on the farm he was one of the most charming men 
 I ever met. 
 
 He had a favorite pastime in collecting stones and 
 piling them so that they could be removed by wagons. 
 It was rather ludicrous to see him bending over, his long, 
 rather lank figure not being exactly suited to the work, 
 but he kept talking all the time and out of courtesy you 
 had to assist in the stone collecting. 
 
 He had the theories of agriculture at his finger ends, 
 but the practical part of it was a sealed book, as wiU 
 develop as this story proceeds. His enthusiasm was catch- 
 ing and you were carried away by his flood of eloquent 
 talk. Sometimes he deviated from his favorite subject 
 and made a raid into the political situation, not only of 
 Canada, but the world in general. He was a friend of 
 Gladstone, John Bright and Cobden, and he had known 
 Lord Palmerston. In the Dominion which owed its birth 
 to him he was first a patriot and then a partisan. He 
 had fought the battle of "Rep by Pop" (representation 
 by population). He had unearthed scandals; he was not 
 too friendly to either Great Britain or the United States. 
 He thought the mother country did not pay proper atten- 
 tion to its child, and the Alabama award did not sit well 
 with him. As we look back, Canada in those days was 
 a bursting bud long held back. She was on the eve of 
 a great evolution. The North-west, still underestimated 
 by the wildest dreamer, was coming to its own. Brown 
 worked for this end never realizing the value of its wheat 
 
 [14] 
 
lands, or the richness of the Pacific provinces. Like Moses, 
 he saw the Promised Land but did not live to see its fru- 
 ition. As I look over the notes made there forty-four 
 years ago it is amazing to see the range of his mentality. 
 
 As an editor, he had to study these matters and down 
 on the farm he let himself loose, expressing freely his 
 views on men and their methods. In the after years 
 when I got to know him better, a good deal of his 
 knowledge was surface work, but his aims were high and 
 his political honesty beyond reproach. Away from his 
 newspaper, on the banks of the Grand River, the Short- 
 horn was Brown's god. He loved them but he treated 
 them badly; further, almost infamously. Then I had no 
 experience of the soiling system and in the two days I 
 was at the farm it looked all right, but for a breeding 
 herd it is unnatural. It may suit a dairy cow you are 
 forcing for milk, but a breeding one is certainly out of 
 place in a close barn in summer time, getting little or 
 no exercise. Nature's functions are not ministered to or 
 expanded. This I will say, however, that I learned more 
 about Shorthorns in these two days than all my previous 
 life, for not only had I Mr. Brown as a preceptor, but 
 Mr. John R. Page of Sennett, N. Y. 
 
 Page was a genius. He came into world-wide fame 
 as the auctioneer at the New York Mills sale. He was 
 a little spare man with the keenest black eyes you ever 
 saw. He was quick, versatile and handled a pencil and 
 brush most effectively. He had come to make some 
 sketches for a sale catalogue, and the rapidity of his work 
 was marvelous; then it was accurate. Many years after- 
 wards I employed him to paint the Fourth Duke of Clar- 
 ence and some of his progeny and the results were more 
 than satisfactory. Over and above his mind was an ency- 
 clopedia of Shorthorn lore and when he was in congenial 
 company he bubbled over with anecdote. Unfortunately 
 
 1151 
 
in after years Mr. Brown and he disagreed about some 
 work he did. When the former died I had to settle the 
 matter under somewhat trying circumstances, but we 
 remained friends all the same and some of the happiest 
 hours I ever spent were with Page. He was a singularly 
 simple-minded man, economical and saving and yet there 
 was a refreshing influence when you associated with him. 
 On his little farm in New York State he spent the evening 
 of his days quietly, respected by his neighbors and all 
 who knew him. I have digressed this far to show what 
 pleasant hours come into your life more or less by acci- 
 dent or better still, by good luck. 
 
 The Bow Park farm consisted of 900 acres; latterly 
 it was increased to 1,000 acres. As a farm it was prob- 
 ably as fine and well adapted to the purpose as can be 
 found on this continent. A third of it was warm gravelly 
 soil, lying up to the bluffs of the river as it rounded the 
 western and northern side of the place. The middle third 
 was a fine loam easily worked and very prolific. The 
 other third, lying on the lowlands on the east and just 
 a little above the river level, was bottom land of the 
 finest quality, rich in alluvial deposit and an ideal tract 
 for permanent grass. When I was there at the above 
 time there were 330 Shorthorns on the place, all females 
 but 56 young and old bulls. The policy was to keep 
 them on the soiling system. In the spring they used rye 
 which had been seeded the previous fall; then came 
 clover, followed by vetches. The rye land had been 
 seeded to corn and after these crops were exhausted the 
 cattle received green corn, and during the fall and winter 
 this was put through a chaff cutter and fed along with 
 hay, roots, etc., till spring time came around and another 
 crop of rye was ready to cut. Large amounts of hay, 
 straw, grain and oil cake were purchased, also plaster and 
 phosphates were liberally used as fertilizers. 
 
 [16] 
 
About forty-five men were employed in summer and 
 twenty-two in winter. They received $15.00 per month 
 and their board. They were mostly Scotch and the very 
 finest type. They were engaged through the immigra- 
 tion oflBice at Toronto and the very choice of the Scottish 
 herdsmen or ploughmen were forwarded to the above 
 farm. No better class of men could be found in any 
 place on the continent. Lots of them are still in Canada 
 and the Western States, doing splendid work and their 
 sons are rising up in many cases to do them honor. The 
 herd itself was mixed as to pedigree but of good indi- 
 vidual merit. A very plain bull, "King of Ocean," had 
 the premier position. He was a light roan, fleshy, but 
 he had an ugly head with upturned horns; altogether not 
 a pleasing animal. Mr. Brown was a student; worse, a 
 devotee of pedigree. He was perfectly innocent of the 
 fine points of an animal and never pretended to be a 
 judge. In after years he would often remark upon his 
 lack in this direction and the pleasure he lost in study- 
 ing the points of an animal, while the paper pedigree 
 absorbed his interest, infatuated him. The worship of 
 pedigree is a fatal disease when you mix with it line 
 breeding and the outcross is damned. It has failed in 
 the human race as evidence the Ptolemys of Egypt, and 
 experience teaches us it is insidious in the bovine race 
 and finally fatal. It works well for a few generations. 
 Yet get the impressive power as Bates, Booth and a host 
 of others got it, but nature revolts. The survival of the 
 strongest is the inevitable law of the universe and while in 
 breeding livestock you can transgress so far, you soon 
 reach the end of the road. In the after years as we will 
 show, it took an awful revenge out of Bow Park. 
 
 As I look back in those days along the vista of time, 
 I cannot help thinking aside from business cares what 
 an ideal life Mr. Brown and his family led at that time. 
 
 [17] 
 
It was a romantic place as it lay in the bend of the 
 Grand River. Much of the primeval forest was left. 
 You could wander about the woods, more especially 
 through the Indian farm, its undergrowth woven into an 
 almost solid mass by wild grape vines and brush of every 
 kind. The laughter of children sounded in the glades 
 and the soft shadowy night crept over the scene before 
 you were aware of it. Then you made for home by the 
 river bank, while across the flats lay the city of Brantford 
 with its twinkling lights. 
 
 Leaving Bow Park I went to Ingersoll. It was then, 
 as now, a small but thriving place; at least, so I judge 
 from the raifroad, as I have only been there once since 
 my first visit. Among several people I met there was 
 the late Tom Miller, who as a boy had worked for my 
 grandfather and who visited us often in the following 
 years on the Borderland. Ingersoll was the center of a 
 great cheese industry in those days and Miller dealt 
 extensively in this product. It was interesting to see the 
 factories and quite a new feature in agriculture to me. 
 My principal object in doubUng back was to see Oxford 
 cou'nty of which Woodstock was the largest town. In 
 coming across the Atlantic, I had met Mr. Andrew 
 P^tullo of Sentinel-Review fame, and he asked me to call 
 on him. His mother was a sister of Mr. Robson, min- 
 ister of the United Presbyterian Church at Lauder, Scot- 
 land, near my home. This made a bond of union betwixt 
 us when we met on shipboard and began a friendship 
 which ended at his death. He was away in the country 
 staying with a brother when I dropped one morning early 
 into the above town, but I had the good fortune to meet 
 his elder brother, George, who kindly took me in charge. 
 
 We drove up the twelfth line, and that is a trip never 
 to be forgotten. Our objective point was the late John 
 Dunlop's home. It was the middle of July. The coun- 
 
 [18[ 
 
try was at its best. As you left the pleasant homes in 
 town, your eye rested on a wooded landscape with rich 
 farrns and fine homesteads. The country was undula- 
 ting, the soil rich and it looked a prosperous, well tilled 
 cou^itryside. We either passed or went into William 
 Donaldson's place; a fine farm, as I recollect it. Dunlop 
 had come out to Canada fourteen years previous to my 
 visit. Hte was a very shrewd, intelligent Scotchman, and 
 we had a most interesting time with him and his fam- 
 ily, and first impressions only deepened my respect for 
 him in the after years. You left the main road and driv- 
 ing up through an avenue, bordered with evergreens, you 
 came to an old fashioned house with broad verandahs, 
 shaded by vines, and very cool in those midsummer days. 
 Dunlop was one of the old school practical farmers. He 
 had not much faith in places like Bow Park or agricul- 
 tural colleges. He wanted elbow room and he had 
 bought quite a tract of land in North Dakota which 
 developed into a fine property. Liatterly he was a fin- 
 ancier rather than a farmer. He had broad views of the 
 future, more especially of the North-west on both sides 
 of the fine, and when I left his hospitable house I felt 
 that something had been missed in my trip by not see- 
 ing the great wheat growing plains in the Red River 
 Valley. 
 
 We continued our drive through the country, land- 
 ing in the evening at Princeton where I took the train 
 to Guelph. Last December I met Mr. George Patullo 
 in Woodstock, hale and hearty with the burden of years 
 resting lightly on him, and it was pleasant to turn back 
 the wheel of time and think of those golden hours we 
 had spent one summer's day amid the farms and wood- 
 lands of one of the best counties in the Dominion. It 
 looks more like merrie England than any place on the 
 continent. 
 
 [19] 
 
At Guelph I was the guest of the Rev. William Ball 
 and his wife, a sister of the Hon. George Brown. We 
 took a drive through the Paisley block. Our first call was 
 on a Mr. Whitelaw. He was a very small man but thick 
 set with a good head; as he was a native of Mertoun, Ber- 
 wickshire, my native country, we soon were deep in con- 
 versation. He had a Mellendeau ram bought from our 
 old neighbor. Miss Stark, which I had seen sold at Kelso 
 the previous autumn. Also a Rock sheep bought from 
 Bosanquet of that place. This was a very good animal, 
 loose in his wool and seemed a great favorite with Mr. 
 Whitelaw. He had 300 acres of beautiful land, a prop- 
 erty he had built up from nothing. On our arrival he 
 was in the hay field and he said, during the conversa- 
 tion, "While you may not see it, every corner of this 
 country has stuck up on it, 'No idlers wanted here.'" 
 Among his cattle was a choice yearling Shorthorn bull 
 and a very good cow that he was preparing to show at 
 Christmas. He was what we would call in Scotland, "a 
 tidy body" and his farm showed it. 
 
 Then we passed on to a Mr. Hobson's who had a fine 
 home and good barns. Hobson, whom I used to meet 
 in after years, was a grand specimen of the Canadian 
 better-class farmer; keen, intelligent and well thought of 
 by neighbors. 
 
 In the afternoon we went for a picnic up the Speed 
 River. A charming trip it was, made in a boat and a 
 canoe. Shortly after landing at our destination, a thun- 
 der storm broke and for forty-five minutes it was fierce. 
 The heavens were opened and although we got shelter 
 for some of us under the upturned boat and canoe, the 
 bulk of us looked like "drookit craws." We came down 
 the little stream in the gloaming. Our way lay serpent- 
 like under trees, brushwood and vine trellises. The sun 
 
 [20] 
 
peeped through now and again, but at last we had only 
 fast waning light. It made me think of the "Graves of 
 a Household," when Mrs. Hemans says: 
 
 "One midst the forests of the West 
 By a dark stream is laid, 
 The Indian knows his place of rest 
 Far in the cedar shade." 
 
 I have touched on these scenes because they left an 
 indelible mark on my mind. They opened another aspect 
 of the world to my eye. For on these farms you saw 
 what was best in trans-atlantic life. The backwoods part 
 of it was past, and round about Woodstock and Guelph 
 it had reached a stage where real hardship was over and 
 science and skill, as much as physical labor, took their 
 part. In the cities there was also great refinement. Dur- 
 ing the above visit and the early eighties when a resident 
 near Brantford, Ontario, there was a chance to study the 
 character of the people, to watch with pleasure their 
 thrift, their skill, not only in the city and on the farm, 
 but also that native ability and independence of mind 
 which builds up first neighborhoods, then parishes, then 
 counties and soon to provinces, ending up with a Domin- 
 ion where in early days Spartan virtues were honorable. 
 And the leaf in that book still stands out in double leaded 
 letters when the sons of the men I speak of went off 
 gaily to France and laid their lives down for the common 
 good. Ah, yes, it is pure gold — not bright and burnished. 
 It has a dull finish, not flashy, but under the surface it 
 is the real article. In these Canadian farms there was 
 not much show. They were even a bit slovenly, for gen- 
 erally that great land hunger, deep-seated in the human 
 breast, asked for more and more acres and there was 
 none too much labor. But there were no slackers. The 
 farmer and his wife did their bit, and the children as 
 they grew up imbibed habits of industry and resourceful- 
 
 [21] 
 
ness. Their views broadened, expanded and yet their 
 moral nature, if anything, waxed stronger, while their 
 education reached a standard enabling them to take their 
 place in any class of society. The bonds of caste were 
 obliterated, despised and rejected. Worth counted more 
 than birth. Industry was held in high repute. There 
 was nobility in that line for it brought success. Merit 
 more than ancestry was the motto of their lives. Not 
 that birth, noble heritage or a long line of illustrious 
 ancestors is a disadvantage; they are a foundation for 
 any man or woman as a starter in life, but the class feel- 
 ing that in my young days prevailed in Great Britain 
 was an incubus on the country which was brushed aside 
 in her colonies. 
 
 Yet these Canadians were as loyal as their forefathers, 
 with this difference — that they had more individuality, a 
 broader expanse of experience and a greater freedom of 
 thought. To some Old Country folks, steeped in con- 
 servatism, some of these ideas may seem radical, but the 
 above are some of the impressions made in those early 
 days and intensified since. Those happy homes, standing 
 under the shadow of a barn that looked like a miniature 
 mountain, the snake fences, the waving fields of grain 
 with here and there an ancient stump that told of long 
 ago, the timbered lot that supplied the winter's fire-wood, 
 and the grassy pastures where milk cows grazed, all told 
 of hardship that grew into supcess. Best of all, as today 
 shows, the foundation was solid, built on a rock that 
 will stand the test of time. 
 
 Returning to Toronto, I met the Hon. Archibald Mc- 
 Kellar, minister of agriculture for the Province of Ontario, 
 and one of the most delightful men I ever met. He was 
 a big man physically and mentally, with an overflowing 
 sense of humor and a repertoire of stories inirnitable and 
 unending. We went up to Muskoka together. At that 
 
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 PANORAMIC VIEW OF BOW PARK FARM, BRANTFORD, ONTARIO, THE GRAKD RIVER MAKING ALMOST AN ISLAND OF THIS C: 
 
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 IF BOW PARK FARM, BRANTFORD, ONTARIO, THE GRA 
 
 
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 FROM PHOTO BY PARK & CO. 
 
 v'D RIVER MAKING ALMOST AN ISLAND OF THIS CELEBRATED FARM 
 
time the Ontario authorities had started a campaign to 
 populate the above region. Nature intended it for a 
 game preserve or a pleasure resort, and it was uphill 
 work for the genial minister to keep his face straight 
 when commenting on the agricultural beauties of this 
 region. We had a glorious trip. There were lovely scenic 
 effects. The lakes were dotted with islands that were 
 reflected in the still deep waters. From a social point of 
 view it was a delightful experience. A genius called Pratt 
 kept the hotel at the head of the lake. Here McKellar 
 and I had to sleep in the same bed, as the house was 
 overflowing. The rooms were not plastered and you 
 could hear most of what went on. McKellar was 
 wakeful and persisted in telhng stories which kept myself 
 and the neighbors in fits of laughter. One tale I remem- 
 ber. McKellar, the Hon. George Brown and Mr. Alex- 
 ander Mackenzie were campaigning in the early days in 
 some backwood place. They had to sleep in a log cabin 
 of one room with a dozen others of whom three or . four 
 were women. Next morning McKellar heard the owner 
 of the Canadian clachan remark to his wife: "Gott tam 
 but I am a bigger man than my father or grandfather 
 before me for she has had an M. P. sleep in my house 
 to-night." 
 
 We went over from Lake Rosseau to Parry Sound. 
 It was the worst piece of road I ever travelled. Even 
 the hardy McKellar groaned under the bad usage we got 
 from rocks and miles of corduroy. Then the mosquitoes 
 were thick as leaves in Vallambrosa. Altogether it was 
 tiresome, intensely hot and so far as agriculture was con- 
 cerned perfectly hopeless. However, the afternoon and 
 evening we spent at the above place was intensely inter- 
 esting for we had a chance to look over the big sawmill 
 and in the evening visited an Indian camp on Parry 
 Island. From this point we returned to Toronto. It was 
 
 [23] 
 
hopeless to say anything about agriculture and neither 
 McKellar nor Mr. Brown whom we interviewed on our 
 return referred to the subject except casually. Lying 
 beyond that country, some fifteen hundred miles, lay Fort 
 Garry and the boundless plains beyond waiting for the 
 plough; the richest land on this continent. The fruit was 
 within reach but it was only some years later that the 
 hand was stretched out to grasp it. 
 
 A week or so later while in Ottawa I renewed my 
 acquaintance with Hon. Mr. Mackenzie, the Premier at 
 that time. Although Mackenzie was an unlucky man 
 politically, I have always looked upon him as a man who 
 just missed greatness. In after years I had countless 
 opportunities of meeting him and his sterling qualities 
 grew stronger upon you as the years rolled round. He 
 had just ousted Sir John A. McDonald, that master hand 
 in the wily conflict of politics, and was living in a mod- 
 est house in the above city. A friend and I dined with 
 him and Mrs. Mackenzie alone one evening. It is one 
 of the nights that remain vivid in memory. The care 
 of office was thrown off and he turned himself loose, to 
 use a western expression, taking a wide, yet graphic grasp 
 of all manner of subjects. He broke away from politics 
 to poetry, from railroad building to religion, from his 
 lowly life in Scotland to his struggle, ever upwards, for- 
 tunately in Canada. There was much of the general, 
 very little of the personal in his talk. His language was 
 chaste, ornate, rich in metaphor and quotations. The 
 natural grimness of his face, an inheritance from his 
 Highland ancestry, disappeared as he began to speak. 
 As the years passed on this feature was intensified and 
 in repose it was very marked. But it fled as he opened 
 his mouth. Perhaps his fault lay in the want of com- 
 promise. If he had led his party gently towards the 
 building of the Canadian Pacific by the lines of least 
 
 [24] 
 
resistance, he might have left behind him an imperish- 
 able name. He lacked the business insight and the polit- 
 ical sagacity to see that the making of a transcontinental 
 line lay primarily in private hands. He had the example 
 in the States before him. A Government with its rolls 
 of red tape can never accomplish satisfactorily a gigantic 
 job of the above kind. It takes men of peculiar aptitude 
 to do it. The hour had come and the men were found 
 to do the job. George Stephen, Donald Smith, James 
 J. Hill and "a host of minor lights." And these men 
 were not altogether saints in the paths of politics, but 
 they made history and made it well. Mackenzie was 
 unyielding, but honest. He worked according to his 
 lights and his aspirations were high. In after years I had 
 to meet him in a business matter. A dispute arose 
 betwixt him and a lifelong friend in which a very consid- 
 erable amount of money was involved. Both thought 
 they were right and at last, after a lot of negotiation, 
 they got to the parting of the ways. Mackenzie never 
 hesitated but sacrificed his friendship to principle. We 
 were on the eve of getting into the law courts when the 
 other party died and I fell heir to the dispute, which in 
 a month or two was amicably settled. 
 
 About a year afterwards at an agricultural show in 
 Glasgow, Scotland, I ran across the above gentleman. 
 George Brown was also in that country. They both came 
 out to my father's home and spent a day or two. To 
 meet them we invited the late George Hope (brother of 
 the Hamilton, Ontario, Hopes) who in his day farmed 
 Fen ton Barns in East Lothian, a man of wonderful abil- 
 ity in his day and generation, a leader in agricultural 
 thought and practice. It was a great meeting. We drove 
 one day up Tweedside, calling at Floors Castle, thence 
 on to Lord Polwarth's at Mertoun to inspect his famous 
 flock of Border Leicester sheep. We took lunch with the 
 
 [25] 
 
late John Usher at Stodrig, author of the "Border Breeds 
 of Sheep," composer of many songs, among them "Mem- 
 ory," yeoman, sportsman and gentleman farmer who did 
 little or no real work on his holding but was present at 
 every sporting gathering or market week days, while often 
 on a Sabbath morning he led the singing in the Church 
 he attended. He was a bit of a wag. Once in synod or 
 court, it matters not which, a minister was being tried 
 for intemperance. The redoubtable John was asked if the 
 minister was intoxicated or not. 
 
 "Well," he said, "I cannot swear that he was drunk, 
 but he was certainly ' o'er a' the ills of life victorious.' " 
 
 In April, 1876, the Hon. George was in Scotland 
 again. He wrote a note saying he was coming out to 
 see us and accordingly one afternoon I met him at the 
 Kelso depot. He was bubbling over with enthusiasm 
 about Bow Park and his Shorthorns, and after his arrival 
 at the house he opened up to my father his plan of turn- 
 ing his farm into a vast breeding place for Shorthorns, 
 Clydesdale horses, Border Leicester and Cotswold sheep 
 and Berkshire hogs. Under his marvelous talk it looked 
 like Aladdin's lamp. He needed money for this devel- 
 opment and aided by the Nelsons (William and Thomas) 
 he was promoting a company in Edinburgh. Thomas 
 Nelson & Sons, of which the above gentlemen were the 
 partners, was a great publishing house in Edinburgh. 
 They were giants in their line and although both of them 
 passed over to the great majority more than a quarter 
 of a century ago, their work still lives under the same 
 name, Mr. Brown's son, George, being one of the leaders 
 in the concern. Mrs. Brown was a sister of these gen- 
 tlemen and cemented a friendship of long family standing. 
 We attended a meeting at the office of Mr. W. J. Men- 
 zies, then and for many years manager of the Scottish- 
 American Investment Co. While not promoted under its 
 
 [26] 
 
influence directly, it came to life under its shadow, as 
 most of the subscribers were shareholders in it. My 
 father and I subscribed $10,000 and when the company 
 was organized I was made buyer of the horses and 
 sheep and to help with shipment of the cattle, etc. Mr. 
 William Ashburner who lived, as I recollect, at Conishead 
 Grange in the Lake District, was engaged to buy the 
 Shorthorns. Meantime Mr. Brown bought quite a few 
 cattle, notably a very fine Oxford heifer from Col. Kings- 
 cote, one of the leading breeders at that time in Eng- 
 land. Ashburner was a devotee of pedigree and acting 
 on Mr. Brown's instructions to buy the best Bates cattle 
 he could find, he managed to keep the price of these aris- 
 tocrats at the boiling point during the summer of 1876. 
 Worse than the price was the fact that there was 
 unloaded on him a lot of delicate animals, shy breeders 
 and very medium individuals. The boom which had 
 burst in the States in that summer lasted a while longer 
 in England, so that the purchases were made in a high 
 market to face a declining one on the other side of the 
 Atlantic. Brown and Ashburner did not last long. There 
 was serious trouble after the first purchases and the lat- 
 ter was no match for the former with the pen. Among 
 other purchases made and probably the only real good 
 individual animal bought by Ashburner, although he had 
 the command of endless money, was the Fourth Duke 
 of Clarence. When he arrived at Bow Park Mr. Brown's 
 indignation knew no limits and my father, who was at 
 the farm at the time, said his first thought was to send 
 him back. This was as far as Mr. Brown's judgment 
 of the points of the animal went, for this bull was a won- 
 derful success in the show ring and his progeny also. 
 Witness Clarence Kirklevington, the steer that at Chi- 
 cago in 1882-84 swept the decks on foot and when killed 
 was champion carcass, and many other animals of great 
 merit and renown. 
 
 [27] 
 
Altogether we shipped nearly one hundred Shorthorns, 
 six Clydesdales and about one hundred sheep. Ashburner 
 resigned and in that year the exporting stopped. The 
 British organization fell to pieces. I remained as nominal 
 buyer for anything that was needed but no orders came. It 
 was silence so far as Scotland was concerned and the 
 shareholders there for more than two years never heard 
 a word. So far as they were concerned Bow Park was 
 a myth. 
 
 About two and a half years after the organization of 
 the company (Bow Park) and no word having been 
 received from the other side, a meeting of the Scotch 
 shareholders was held. It was rather a painful one for 
 the Nelson Brothers, but there was no criticism of their 
 actions. It was finally arranged that some one should 
 go out, and as I was the only practical man at the meet- 
 ing, it was decided that as soon after the New Year as 
 possible I should go to Canada. So I left on the White 
 Star Steamer "Celtic," and after a very stormy passage 
 landed in Toronto about the 20th of January. I went 
 to the Queen's Hotel, then the chief hostelry of Toronto 
 — a wonderfully comfortable place. 
 
 Next morning Mr. Brown came to call on me and 
 his first words were, "Are you here for peace or war?" 
 "For neither," I replied. "What we want is the truth 
 and if you had rephed to letters and appeals there would 
 have been no occasion for this trip." The result was 
 that I went up to his house (Lambton Lodge) and for 
 over two months made it my headquarters. It was a 
 delightful place to stay. 
 
 I made frequent trips to Bow Park, to other points 
 in Canada, and a short trip at Mr. Brown's request via 
 Chicago to Kentucky. They were badly in want of a 
 young bull at the time but nothing turned up at any 
 point I visited at all suitable, and the matter was 
 
 [28] 
 
dropped. During those two months I had a difl&cult part 
 to play. The company was fast drifting towards bank- 
 ruptcy. The pure-bred business, more especially the 
 Bates Shorthorns, had been practically dead for two 
 years. No sales at high prices had been made. There 
 had been a heavy loss by death in the purchases made 
 in England. Canada and the United States had been 
 going through a period of extreme financial depression. 
 The plain bred cattle which had been weeded out sold 
 very low and the result was a most disappointing con- 
 dition of affairs. It was practically all outgo and very 
 little income. But Mr. Brown was enthusiastic, optimis- 
 tic and overflowing with the great results to be expected 
 in the future. It was only when you got to the farm 
 and sat quietly down to study the situation that you had 
 some misgivings. When you got back to Toronto and 
 came under the spell of Mr. Brown's eloquence the sun 
 shone again. 
 
 I was then twenty-seven years of age. My life, except 
 a trip to the States and Canada described in former chap- 
 ters, had been on the farm, in the valley of the Tweed 
 amid the Lammermoors and on the green hillsides of 
 Cheviot. My daily work was on the practical side, for 
 my father held tight the reins of finance, the trading and 
 other outside work. But I had been sent out to inves- 
 tigate and after looking over the situation I told Mr. 
 Brown I was going to remain till we got to the bottom 
 of the company's affairs, and that we must have a com- 
 plete set of accounts prepared, audited by a public 
 accountant, so that I could take them home. It was a 
 pathetic sort of a job, as it revealed a melancholy state 
 of affairs, notwithstanding that we inventoried the best 
 animals at old time prices. The expenses were steadily 
 accumulating; debts which were to have been paid with 
 part of the money gotten from Scotch shareholders were not 
 
 [29] 
 
met and were being carried at high interest. Not a single 
 sale was made while I was over and a lot of bulls were 
 eating their heads off. While Mr. Brown erred in not 
 stating his position candidly to the shareholders, he was 
 the victim of circumstances and we must admit bad judg- 
 ment; in fact, he had rushed into this scheme years 
 before with a patriotic impulse, hoping to help his 
 adopted country and build up a monument for himself. 
 It was a laudable ambition, but the country was not 
 ready for it, as it would have been today. Canada was 
 too poor and the market in the United States was far 
 away and fickle. Then this place had to bear not only 
 the incubus of paper pedigree, but the management was 
 poor. I had been carried away four and a half years 
 before by the gloss of summer and the absence of know- 
 ledge of the market. Now we had to face the stern 
 reality of dollars and cents. For two years after the 
 company was organized Mr. Brown had worked 
 away with his old organization but during the year 1878, 
 he secured the services of the late John Hope. I had 
 met Hope in England in 1876, so when I went down to 
 the farm in January, 1879, I renewed an acquaintance 
 and got a hearty welcome, and there commenced a firm 
 friendship which lasted till his death in 1894. 
 
 Hope, who was born in the north of England, near 
 Cockermouth, and settled in Canada, was an importer, 
 but the collapse of the purebred trade in 1877 had left 
 him stranded, somewhat involved and Mr. Brown 
 had the good sense to engage him as cattle superintend- 
 ent. Hope in certain lines was a most remarkable man. 
 He was the most genial, kind-hearted, lovable companion. 
 He would divide up his last dollar with a friend 
 and while he had strong likes and dislikes he was chari- 
 table even to his enemies and like every man he had 
 some. In this connection I quote the last paragraph of 
 
 [30] 
 
I ' . I,' ' ■'■' ' 'iii'il''"*; ' ' 'V. > 
 
 'W ' ' ' " 'i ii ■ "' i'.'' * """., 'I'.'v'.V 1. , V'l 1 
 
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 »■ Ji', ,1" 
 
 i' ', 'V.'iWi' 
 
 'l * .K.1 ','0 
 
 ,.'V 
 
 . 1 1' 
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 t t 
 
 "(1 ll \ 
 
 a 'I" 
 
 
 JOHN HOPE 
 
an article I wrote at the time of Hope's death, published 
 first in Clay, Robinson & Company's " Live Stock 
 Report," and incorporated in Mr. A. H. Sanders' great 
 work, "Shorthorn Cattle": 
 
 "In personal appearance Hope was broad and burly, 
 a grand specimen of the English yeoman. Apart from 
 his general contour his prominent feature was the eye. 
 He was the possessor of a pair of great luminous blue 
 eyes, that imparted to his appearance a singularly soft 
 and winning expression. When a child entered the room 
 it invariably went straight up to him, and through those 
 eyes beamed forth all that was tender and true in his 
 nature. Simple himself as a child, generous to a fault, 
 strong in his friendships, with the heart of a lion, yet 
 the mildness and gentleness of a lamb, he leaves behind 
 a record for probity as a heritage to all who knew him. 
 Let us inscribe this sentiment to his memory: That the 
 leading feature of his life was sympathy; or, to go deeper 
 still, shall we call it love — love of mankind and the dumb 
 creation, the flower which has bloomed perennially ever 
 since the day Adam and Eve left the gates of Paradise." 
 
 Mr. Brown did not develop him. He always treated 
 him as a sort of upper farm hand, whereas he was a 
 man of broad instincts, high ideals and not only an able 
 manager, but a good financier. As a judge of live stock 
 he may have had an equal; certainly no superior. It is 
 results that tell. Before, and more especially afterwards 
 when he became manager at Bow Park, he showed what 
 he could do in dozens of show rings. 
 
 At the time I write of, three men were or had been 
 operating extensively in Canada in importing livestock 
 for themselves or others: Richard Gibson, John Hope 
 and Simon Beattie. Gibson was the most polished and 
 well read, endless anecdotes and facts being stored by a 
 retentive memory and conveyed by a facile pen to his 
 
 [31] 
 
readers. He had also a charming personality, with a 
 great deal of tact and generosity in his nature. Hope 
 was also an innate gentleman but he had not the educa- 
 tion of his contemporary and had a bluflf, hearty manner. 
 And he had a habit in a perfectly good natured way of 
 expressing his opinions rather abruptly. Simon Beattie 
 was a unique character, a bit rough and ready in his 
 methods, practical, persuasive in a deal, with more or 
 less Scotch bluntness. He was rather a poor business 
 man and after a long Ufe of industry and enterprise left 
 little to show for it. These men did great work for 
 Canada. They blazed a trail which is now a macadam 
 road. Looking back I consider it a great privilege to 
 have known them intimately. I do not care which one 
 of them you associated with, you could gather experience 
 from their walk and conversation. All of them had risen 
 from the ranks to be commanding figures, and their work 
 lives after them. 
 
 During this visit I met many interesting characters; 
 notably the Hon. David Christie, who had done much 
 for agriculture. He had passed his zenith and was in 
 financial difficulties, but he was a very interesting man, 
 a typical Scot and ardent politician. His fine farm on 
 the Paris plains was very much run down and his 
 beloved Shorthorns were gone. He and George Brown 
 were great cronies and they loved to talk of their early 
 days and tell of backwood scenes. Away from Mr. 
 Brown, however, Hope's company was the most con- 
 genial. It was a constant fountain of pleasure to walk 
 round the barns with him and almost daily we had 4th 
 Duke of Clarence walked out. He had a majestic step 
 and a wonderfully expressive head, and while looking out 
 of his box he would greet Hope with a low bellow and 
 then lick his hand. "A fellow feeling makes a mortal 
 wondrous kind." That was the relationship betwixt the 
 
 [32] 
 
two. There was also a lot of good show cattle; notably 
 "Butterfly Duchess," a very sweet Kirklevington heifer, 
 a Maid of Oxford heifer calf and many others. 
 
 Mr. Brown managed the concern principally by wire. 
 He had a frank for his private business to and from the 
 farm and he sent long messages of instruction; in fact, 
 he was the whole push. Nominally there were other 
 directors, notably Major Greig, a very delightful man, 
 quite typical of the old school, and who had bred Short- 
 horns on his farm before moving to Toronto. I was 
 always sorry for the dear old Major. He had practically 
 nothing to say, although he had invested quite a sub- 
 stantial sum for him in the concern. While not inten- 
 tional, Mr. Brown, was very arrogant in his methods; in 
 fact, there was nothing favorable to show in the way of 
 results and the lines of least resistance were the easiest 
 way to cover up dif&culties and disappointments. The 
 gallant Major would come over to Lambton Lodge for 
 dinner to have a pow-wow over Bow Park matters, but 
 we talked generalities and never got down to business. 
 Still those were delightful hours and a young man listen- 
 ing could learn a lot. 
 
 Mr. John Young Reid was also a director and 
 treasurer of the company, but this job was a sinecure as 
 Mr. Brown was supplying the money to run the concern 
 and Mr. Reid's work consisted in countersigning what 
 cheques were drawn on the bank accoimt. Mr. Reid was 
 a native of Berwickshire and coming from that county 
 and having many mutual friends, we soon struck up a 
 close intimacy which ripened in the after years into last- 
 ing friendship, a sort of hero worship, for Mr. Reid was 
 one of the most lovable characters I ever met. He was 
 a member of the firm of Buntin, Reid & Co., paper 
 manufacturers, and in this way came in close contact 
 with Mr. Brown who owned the Toronto Globe. Reid 
 
was a typical Scotchman, a small, thickset man with a 
 fine head stored full of good business sense, a streak of 
 quiet humor running through his nature. He had been 
 born near Abbey St. Bathans; a lovely spot where pine 
 woods, heather and sparkling streams blend together and 
 make glorious pictures. His motherland had been my 
 playground as a boy at school, and as he had a rich way 
 of describing these scenes, touching them with a master 
 hand, we spent many an hour going over ground beaten 
 but hallowed by the glow of youth. Mr. Reid was the 
 very opposite of Mr. Brown. He was cautious, conser- 
 vative, close in his business methods, nothing of the 
 cavalier in his make-up. If you could have welded Mr. 
 Brown's energy and fiery zeal on to Mr. Reid's good 
 judgment, then you would have had a combination hard 
 to beat. In his social hours Mr. Reid was at his best. 
 Born under the strictest form of Scottish Presbyterian- 
 ism, he had broadened out, retaining all that was good 
 and throwing away a lot of the silly dogmatism of his 
 upbringing. He stuck sternly to his old faith, but he 
 mixed it with a fine vein of charity, giving not only 
 freely of this world's goods, but judging people kindly. 
 There was ever a tender note speaking from a warm 
 heart. He was a prototype of the Apostle John, while 
 his friend Mr. Brown carried on his banner the insignia 
 of St. Paul or Richard Coeur-de-Lion. 
 
 When we got the accounts made up, the Major and 
 Mr. Reid were called in and it was a tree barren of fruit 
 that was presented to us. There was not a single ray 
 of light on the horizon. As I have said before, Canada 
 was poor at that time, but aside from this, Mr. Brown, 
 who had been a hard hitter politically, was not at the 
 time very popular. The financial group were shy of him. 
 You did not see this on the outside, but the insider saw 
 it at once. Then Bow Park was looked on as a fad and 
 
 [34] 
 
the ordinary farmer would not visit it. Consequently, it 
 had in this way a big burden to carry. The small 
 breeders were jealous and the news had spread abroad 
 that there was a lot of tuberculosis about. But when 
 you boil down all these criticisms, it resolves itself into 
 a case of base ingratitude, for no man ever worked harder 
 for Canada than did Brown. The world does not always 
 treat its benefactors kindly and I am afraid George 
 Brown towards the end of his Ufe carried this burden 
 round with him. It was evident something had to be 
 done so far as the affairs of the company were concerned, 
 and a few days before I left for Scotland, and after we 
 had got at the bottom of the accounts for the past three 
 years, Mr. Brown proposed to me that I should take the 
 management of the company. I had seen enough, how- 
 ever, not to be very eager on the subject. As it turned 
 out Mr. Brown had a further object in view. The com- 
 pany was near its end financially and he thought if I 
 came over that he could get some help from the other 
 side. Going ahead of my story, he unfortimately did not 
 disclose to his relatives in Edinburgh his personal posi- 
 tion and it was not tiU after his unfortunate tragic 
 death that the truth was known. Anyway, it was a 
 great compliment to be asked to take the management of 
 what was probably at that time the largest breeding 
 establishment on this side of the Atlantic. And on the 
 other hand, it was more or less vanity for a Scotch 
 farmer of no great experience even to think of it. But 
 events ofttimes force issues. 
 
 On my arrival in Edinburgh I was at once called into 
 consultation by the late Mr. Thomas Nelson. He was 
 prepared for the worst, and while visibly annoyed he did 
 not say a great deal. While quite deaf Mr. Nelson had 
 admirable control of himself. It was a curious position 
 all round. Mr. Brown, on account of relationship and a 
 
 [35] 
 
very old acquaintance, was a great favorite with the 
 Nelson family. He measured up to their ideals in social, 
 political and religious life. In addition he had a vast 
 Scotch and particularly Edinburgh coterie of friends. 
 His name was a household word in the land of his birth. 
 You heard the story told as an example to be followed. 
 The poor boy leaving his native place, his early 
 struggles, the visits back to his old home, his marriage 
 to one of its fairest daughters, the ladder of success 
 climbed first as a newspaper man, then in politics, and 
 lastly the man triumphant and all the glamour that 
 comes from splendid achievement. That morning sitting 
 in St. Leonard's library, that looks out on hallowed 
 scenes, I had to play an unkind part as the medium to 
 tell the truth and expose what in the end turned out to 
 be the tragedy of Bow Park. 
 
 There was some ill-feeling at the meeting when it was 
 held. It was not what was said; it was what was left 
 unsaid and the rather grim look of some of the share- 
 holders. Eventually only one man a few years after- 
 wards commenced a suit against the Nelsons, who were 
 far the largest holders of stock, and who eventually took 
 over the place, its belongings, and local debts. This suit 
 was compromised. I do not name the party who took 
 this action, which was really a piece of blackmail. There 
 may have been some legal grounds for an action; 
 certainly no moral ones, for a higher minded, more 
 magnanimous pair of men never lived than William and 
 Thomas Nelson. Further still, through the splendid 
 judgment of the latter the Scotch public were introduced 
 to a most profitable lot of American investments. My 
 recollection of what took place during the next few 
 months has passed from memory, but it was arranged 
 that I should become manager of the company, and early 
 in August I left for my new position. A contract was 
 
 [36] 
 
RICHARD GIBSON 
 
made for a three years' term. While no arrangement 
 was made as to financial assistance by increase of capital 
 or in the shape of loans, it was evidently expected on 
 Mr. Brown's part, and while nothing definite was said 
 and I had no instructions to help out in this way it led 
 on to a coolness on Mr. Brown's part, which existed to 
 his death. I took hold about 20th of August, 1879, and 
 began a very arduous, unpleasant job, mitigated after 
 Mr. Brown's passing by the generous support of Mr. 
 Thomas Nelson. Looking back it was a great experience, 
 full of difliculties and disappointments, but youth brushes 
 these aside and the memories left are pleasant ones. 
 With the exception of Hope, the employees were mostly 
 hostile and it took tact and discretion to overcome this 
 attitude. There were a lot of splendid men on the farm, 
 but they had been accustomed to having a great deal 
 of their own way. Then, unfortunately, owing to Mr. 
 Brown spending little time there personally, he kept one 
 department jealous of another, forgetting that team work 
 is essential in farm work as on the field of battle. Hope 
 and the farm manager were equal in power which would 
 have been all right if there had been a boss above both. 
 When I came to the scene I was supposed to assume the 
 management, but it was hard for Mr. Brown to let go. 
 Equally hard was it for the stranger with no experience 
 in Canadian farming to grasp the situation, to size up the 
 climate, to prepare for winter and at the same time learn 
 the intricacies of a pecuUar business. To Hope I had 
 to appeal daily, almost hourly for advice and assistance. 
 This did not sit well with Mr. Brown whose estimate 
 of the above party was not very high, at least in a busi- 
 ness way. Gradually we made progress. The herd was 
 in good shape. There had been a fierce shrinkage among 
 the imported cattle from disease. 
 
 [37] 
 
Through Hope's skill and the material on hand a very 
 fine lot of show cattle had been got together. Two bulls 
 of great quaUty were on hand — 4th Duke of Clarence, 
 then five years old, and Chevalier, a young two-year-old 
 bull purchased from Mr. Richard Gibson. In addition 
 were some good younger bulls, and a superb lot of 
 females. Never can I forget the first night I stayed at 
 the farm when Hope had all the show cattle led out. It 
 was a cool, pleasant evening after a very warm day, and 
 it seems almost like yesterday to see Hope with his 
 briar-root pipe stand amidst a grove of glorious oaks and 
 watch James Smith and his assistant herdsmen parade as 
 good a lot of Shorthorns as any one could wish to see. 
 There were all told about twenty-five head all wound up 
 and ready for the ring. That year we only showed in 
 Canada — Toronto, Ottawa, London and then at Brant- 
 ford. It was a pity that we did not make the rounds 
 of the fairs in the States. However, we sent our Clydes- 
 dales over there and practically swept the platter. John 
 Raeside, now with Mr. Samuel Insull, whose farm is 
 north of Chicago, was in charge of our horses and a rare 
 good man he was at this class of work. He used to 
 shock Mr. Brown with some of his west country expres- 
 sions concerning horses and other things. 
 
 A few days after arriving at the above place and 
 getting down to work, I had a letter from the British 
 Government appointing me as Assistant Commissioner of 
 an Agricultural Commission then sitting in England. 
 This was totally unexpected, but it was in many ways 
 a help. It came unfortunately at a very busy time. 
 Consulting Mr. Brown he advised acceptance, and for 
 the next three years I was more or less busy at this 
 work, and in February, 1882, appeared as a witness 
 before the Commission then sitting in London. Messrs. 
 Clare Sewell-Read and Albert Pell, both members of the 
 
 [38] 
 
British Parliament, were deputed to visit the States and 
 Canada. They were splendid associates and made a long 
 tour in both countries. I could only accompany them 
 part of the time, but when they left they deputized me 
 to take up some parts of the work they could not cover. 
 The main questions we had to consider and report upon 
 were as to the production of wheat and what it would 
 cost to lay it down in Liverpool, England. Meat pro- 
 duction, while secondary, was also studied. I would not 
 like to read that report today. Our figures were too 
 high and were knocked to smithereens. We did not fore- 
 see the vast influence of the self-binder, improved farm 
 machinery, but principally the genius of Mr. James J. 
 Hill in conquering transportation problems and the 
 wonderful progress made in the transatlantic trade. 
 Nowadays our figures look like thirty cents at the 
 present price of wheat. A strong protection party was 
 working under cover in Great Britain. It had not 
 blossomed forth as it did several years ago, but the 
 farmer was restless and the Disraeli Government of those 
 days was friendly to that interest, as all Governments 
 should be. So far as our work was concerned, nothing 
 came of it. But it was a great experience for a young 
 man and it led on to many friendships which have 
 lasted. So the first months of my new life passed away 
 rapidly. We got more at the shows than we expected 
 and as soon as they were through we began preparations 
 to hold a sale of cattle at Dexter Park, Chicago, Illinois, 
 on October 17th. It was my first experience in selling 
 cattle in this country and I had little idea then of what 
 vast numbers would pass through my hands in the years 
 to come. Hope and I went to Chicago several days 
 ahead and had our cattle in fine shape to show in the 
 ring. Then Mr. Brown and party came a day ahead. 
 We all made headquarters at The Grand Pacific and 
 
 [39] 
 
there was a good sized gathering of Shorthorn men. So 
 far as I recollect, not a single Canadian breeder attended. 
 Col. J. W. Judy was the auctioneer and I had the 
 pleasure of making his acquaintance. What a grand old 
 Roman he was! He was then about fifty years of age 
 and was in his prime so far as autioneering was con- 
 cerned. The men outside of him I remember most 
 vividly were Tom Corwin Anderson, the Hamiltons, Jim 
 Bigstaii from Kentucky, the Smiths, Funks, Browns from 
 Illinois, Henry Brown from Minneapolis and Long John 
 Wentworth of Chicago. Brabrook was then proprietor of 
 the Live Stock Journal, a monthly publication, and as far 
 as I recollect, the elder Sanders was the editor. We con- 
 gregated at night in the rotunda of the hotel. We told 
 a good many stories and took a good many toddies 
 throughout the evening. We had rather a poor sale, but 
 Mr. Brown was quite cheery and optimistic. On the 
 evening of the sale after dinner we walked along from 
 the hotel to the Western Union Telegraph Co. where Mr. 
 Brown sent ofif a message concerning the sale to the 
 Globe. When I retired that night I had reached another 
 milestone in my career. 
 
 After this sale we began settling down for winter. 
 Personally, I devoted considerable time to the Agricul- 
 tural Commission work, but towards the end of November 
 came back to Bow Park, intending to stay there all win- 
 ter. For some time previous to our sale in October there 
 were rumors of the United States shutting out Canadian 
 cattle on account of disease. This talk, which was more 
 or less exploited in the newspapers, excited Mr. Brown 
 and I was sent over to Chicago to arrange accommoda- 
 tions for SO to 100 head of Shorthorns. On Mr. Hope's 
 recommendation I went up to Waukegan, Illinois, a small 
 town about 36 miles north of Chicago. C. C. Parks had, 
 in old days, a fine herd of cattle there. Those had been 
 
 [40] 
 
sold out but the barns were still there and were in the 
 hands of a Dr. Bean, either as owner or lessee. The 
 place was very much run down but I rented this place 
 and began fixing it up. After completing the arrange- 
 ments, I took the evening train at Chicago for Brantford. 
 When we got to Harrisburg in the morning about nine- 
 thirty or ten o'clock the depot master informed me that 
 the buildings at Bow Park had been burned during the 
 night. He could not tell me how many and whether any 
 of the stock had been lost. It was before the days of 
 telephones being much in use and it was only when I got 
 to Brantford about eleven o'clock that I found that no 
 cattle or horses had been lost, but the most of the barns, 
 all of our feed except some hay in outside barns had 
 gone. It was a solar plexus blow. 
 
 The scene of devastation at the farm was a sad sight. 
 The most valuable cattle were housed in two of the big 
 buildings that were left and the balance were outside 
 among the woods. The big barn with its basement full 
 of roots and crammed to the door with hay, grain, imple- 
 ments, etc., was a great smoking ruin. Fortunately the 
 dwelling houses were intact. Mr. Brown came from 
 Toronto, arriving in the afternoon with about an hour 
 of daylight. He was completely dazed and did not say 
 much — what his thoughts were I never knew. We called 
 in Hope and sat down to discuss matters. We had our 
 plans sketched out. Up at Brantford, about four miles 
 away, there was a spacious fair ground with very good 
 buildings, among them several rows of stalls. The board 
 of management was friendly and they at once offered us, 
 while the fire was still under way, the free use of what- 
 ever accommodations we needed. This solved the difl&- 
 culty of housing the cattle. It meant for the winter a 
 divided household. Then we had the barns in sight at 
 Glen Flora, near Waukegan. All kinds of feed, such as 
 
 [41] 
 
hay, straw, grain, oilcake, etc., were abundant and cheap. 
 After a couple of hours' talk Mr. Brown returned to 
 Toronto and we began the re-organization of our affairs. 
 The weather was rainy, the roads soft, and we had an 
 awful time hauling in the different classes of feed. We 
 had to drive over the country to buy hay and straw, 
 purchase nurse cows and other materials. We were hard 
 up for money, had poor equipment, and when I look back 
 I often think of the hardships we had to go through. In 
 the long lapse of years those days look Uke a nightmare 
 now, although at the time we did not feel this way. 
 There was too much to do and think about. The fire 
 was undoubtedly the work of an incendiary. They say 
 a new broom sweeps clean, and the change of manage- 
 ment did not sit well in some quarters. Changes had to 
 be made and naturally there was much dissatisfaction 
 among the employees. Hope and the herdsmen were 
 loyal and had always been so, but there were others, 
 who, with fair faces, had the devil in their hearts. Con- 
 ditions, however, had to be met and a bold face put on 
 and face the music. As I grappled with the manage- 
 ment, our serious position financially became apparent. 
 Mr. Brown was evidently struggling with other matters, 
 as well as with Bow Park, in this line. The fire called 
 for extra expenditure and as a quick settlement of insur- 
 ance was delayed by a disagreement with the company 
 that had written our policies, a heavy burden was thrown 
 upon him. He faced it without a murmur as far as we 
 were concerned. 
 
 December was a soft, rainy month. The roads got 
 into horrible condition and as we had only a pair of 
 fifteen hand ponies and an old democrat, it was a miser- 
 able business getting about. We ploughed through mud 
 roads at many places nearly up to the hubs, and many 
 a night we had to wade back to the farm with a 
 
 [42] 
 
tired team and a somewhat heavy heart. By Christmas 
 time we had got matters fairly well arranged. The barns 
 near Brantford worked well and we had no trouble secur- 
 ing all the feed needed at lower prices than it would have 
 been delivered at the farm. An old barn near the main 
 buildings had been fixed up for our horses. As I recol- 
 lect we had about twelve teams. Fortunately our 
 Clydesdale horses had been sold at the October sale in 
 Chicago and we had only work stock on hand. The day 
 before Christmas I had gone up to Stratford to look over 
 the cheese factories in that neighborhood with the late 
 Mr. Ballantine, a man of strong and splendid character. 
 We spent Christmas morning driving refund and I took 
 afternoon dinner with Mr. Thomas Brown, a fine old 
 gentleman from the Borderland, whose nephew Uved near 
 us on Tweed side. Just as I was taking the train to go 
 back to Brantford, I got a wire from Mr. Brown saying 
 the horse barn had been burned and most of the horses 
 lost, and to return home at once. Here was another 
 horrible disaster. Miss Nelson of Edinburgh, sister of 
 Mrs. Brown, was spending the winter with her and the 
 Hon. George. She told me afterwards that he sat down 
 and wept like a child. A long series of misfortunes had 
 filled his cup with bitterness. In the Bow Park venture 
 one trouble after another had heaped Pelion on Ossa. 
 There was the disappointment in the purchases made in 
 England, the collapse of the pedigree business in the 
 States, the puncturing of the fashion craze with its motto 
 of pure Bates and no surrender, the want of demand in 
 Canada, the heavy losses from disease and shy breeders, 
 the hopeless maze of all pay out and very httle coming 
 in was all saddened by the above fires accentuated by 
 the knowledge of the party who was the author. You 
 could point your finger, but you dare not utter a name. 
 
 [43] 
 
It was a sad sort of holiday. I felt it dreadfully, for 
 unwittingly the latter disaster possibly came from the 
 injection of new blood into the enterprise. 
 
 The day after Christmas, for I had got back late the 
 previous night, was a sort of Waterloo. There was the 
 smoking barn, the dead horses, the idle teamsters, and 
 everything more or less disorganized. Fortunately some 
 horses had been in the other barns and we were not com- 
 pletely afoot. The wires to Toronto were soon working 
 and the next day Hope left for Markham, his old stamp- 
 ing ground, where he bought a lot of fine horses. How 
 we housed them I have forgotten, but we got along and 
 before spring had an excellent lot of teams. With new 
 harness and a lot of new equipment in wagons and other 
 implements, we made quite a showing. Mr. Brown did 
 not come down and, as I recollect, never saw Bow Park 
 again. We had a sale of some forty head of our plainest 
 pedigree Shorthorns and some sheep and hogs towards 
 the end of January. It was a good deal of a frost but 
 we got quit of a lot of animals that were doing us 
 no good and it Ughtened our expense materially. Mr. 
 Brown got into Brantford late the night before the sale 
 and returned to Toronto the next evening. He made a 
 very eloquent speech before the auctioneer mounted the 
 rostrum, but it failed to put enthusiasm into the crowd, 
 who were mostly curiosity seekers. He told the audience 
 of what improved live stock would do for Canada. 
 Every word seems golden in these latter days, but the 
 seed fell on stony ground. The Dominion maker was 
 ahead of his time by thirty years. Meantime the agita- 
 tion against Canadian cattle was growing in the States 
 and we decided to send over about fifty head to the Glen 
 Flora barns. After careful consideration we selected a lot 
 of good animals, none of very rich pedigree according to 
 the fashion of these days, but a really good lot from an 
 
 [44] 
 
individual point of view. Hope took charge of this lot 
 and turned them out in fine shape at a sale we held at 
 Dexter Park about the middle of April, 1880. With the 
 above sale and the exodus to the States our position 
 eased up considerably. Meanwhile I had to go up fre- 
 quently to Toronto to consult with Mr. Brown. The 
 Globe newspaper and other interests took most of his 
 time and it was a hard thing to get an hour or two of it. 
 Then there had sprung up a coolness between us in con- 
 nection with insurance matters. The buildings were over- 
 insured. The insurance company offered to replace the 
 buildings. This Mr. Brown would not agree to. Then 
 he asked me to make affidavit as to the value of them, 
 placing his own figures in this document. This I could 
 not honestly sign and said as the president of the com- 
 pany it was his province to fight out this matter, 
 not mine. I came back to the farm uncertain what was 
 going to happen. A few days afterwards, 25th of March, I 
 received a wire saying Mr. Brown had been shot by 
 an employee — an engineer employed in the Globe boiler- 
 room, and whom he had never seen or heard of. It was 
 a slight wound, but did not readily heal. He sent me 
 several messages about various matters, never mention- 
 ing insurance. Then he wired me to come up. We had 
 a very pleasant interview. He looked like his old self 
 and talked hopefully of being about in a week or two, 
 but blood-poisoning set in and he died on the 10th 
 of May. 
 
 In his death Canada lost a great personality. He had 
 passed the zenith of his power politically and his influence 
 was on the wane, but he had a force of character seldom 
 met with. Then in his idle hours there was a magnetism 
 lasting in its effects. When I meet some of the old 
 guard who knew him — they are few and far between now- 
 adays — they always speak kindly, almost reverently, 
 
 [45] 
 
about him. He was built on strong lines, physically and 
 mentally, well adapted to the rugged work of the back- 
 woods and the frontier. Whatever may have been his 
 faults in the arena of business, politics or farming, he had 
 a splendid influence on the growing generation and his 
 home life was unique in its beauty and sweetness. 
 
 During his illness we held our April sale. We had asked 
 Major Greig and Mr. John Young Reid to go through to 
 Chicago and help things along. We had, therefore, a 
 strong representation, but not satisfied with this, the 
 cashier of the Globe was sent over to look after the 
 finances and as the sale went on he sent Mr. Brown mes- 
 sages as to the prices the cattle made. We had an excel- 
 lent sale, the buUs especially bringing good prices. Lee 
 & Reynolds of Fort Supply, Indian Territory, were good 
 bidders on the latter and made the work of Col. Judy 
 easy as they kept the ball rolling. 
 
 After Mr. Brown's death the company was in straits 
 for money. We had drawn for what was needed on him 
 personally and of course this supply was cut off. We 
 were unable to make another sale till the fall at the 
 earhest. Fortunately Mr. Thomas Nelson came to our 
 aid. Further, he came over to Canada to help unravel 
 Mr. Brown's affairs, and in doing so he practically took 
 hold of Bow Park, eventually taking it over. He agreed 
 to supply money for new buildings and running expenses. 
 He did what was right, responding in the most generous 
 way to every demand made upon him. Unfortunately, 
 as seen in the light of later days, I advised him to con- 
 tinue on and run the place. Hope, whose heart was in 
 the business, was very strong on continuing. He thought, 
 as all of us did, that the Shorthorn industry, the fash- 
 ionable part of it especially, was going to recover, and 
 that Bow Park would come into its own again. It 
 is needless to say that this was a great mistake and a lot 
 more money was thrown into this melting pot. 
 
 [46] 
 
During July Mr. Nelson came down and visited the 
 place for several days and enjoyed it immensely. While 
 the buildings were mostly gone, the farm was looking 
 splendidly. Most of the cattle were at pasture, and 
 towards evening when the cows spread themselves over 
 the fields or came into the open on the Indian farm, it 
 was a pleasing sight to a lover of art and the beautiful, 
 and Mr. Nelson had all the instincts and sentiments of 
 a painter, only he painted with the pen instead of the 
 brush. After this, aside from the responsibility landed 
 upon Hope and myself, we had a pleasant time. The 
 winter was over with all its trials and we were enjoying 
 a splendid summer. We began building about midsum- 
 mer and under the guidance of Mr. T. H. Goff, an archi- 
 tect from Woodstock, and David Bale, a contractor from 
 the same town, work went on at a tremendous rate. 
 The new buildings were of brick with slate roofs and 
 they stand there to this day, so far as I know. The 
 stable went up first, then the big barn, and latterly the 
 cattle sheds, three of the old wooden sheds being left 
 from the fire. We could accommodate about 250 cattle 
 and twenty-five horses. We had more room than we 
 could conveniently carry cattle and had to buy a lot of 
 hay, straw and concentrated feeds. 
 
 Immediately on the opening of spring we began to 
 drain the buildings and brought up a main ditch from 
 the Grand River. It seemed almost criminal that this 
 had not been done before. The spaces betwixt the barns 
 in spring were a slough of despond. Out in the fields the 
 bane of our life was foxtail and we began to eradicate 
 that pest. I bought some gang-ploughs and immediately 
 the grain was harvested and cleared from the fields — we 
 skimmed them about four inches deep with the above. 
 The fall rains brought away a fine crop of weeds. Then 
 we got the old-fashioned ploughs to work and turned over 
 
 [47] 
 
a nine-inch furrow, which produced another crop of weeds 
 that were frost killed. Next spring it was in pretty- 
 decent shape. Hope, after I left, raised some big crops 
 of wheat and had the farm in splendid condition. 
 
 With three sales in six months we had depleted our 
 herd seriously, so we decided not to hold a fall sale, and 
 consequently our work was fairly easy, nor did we 
 attempt to take in the Fairs. In fact, we were busy 
 building, reorganizing and endeavoring to foimd a fine 
 herd of cattle. With no disease and drafting we had at 
 this time an excellent herd of cattle full of individual 
 merit and a lot of pedigrees that charmed the eye. At 
 the head of the herd was 4th Duke of Clarence, who had 
 done much to restore prestige to it. We had a lot of 
 healthy, splendidly bred young things that were a credit 
 to any farm or breeding establishment and when shown 
 had been invincible. We changed our methods entirely. 
 The soiling system disappeared. Nearly all of the cattle 
 but a few special animals and the bulls were at pasture. 
 James Smith, who was with Mr. Flatt, Hamilton, Ontario, 
 and since with Senator Edwards, had immediate charge 
 of the cattle. He was a natural born cattleman and 
 made a splendid record with us as with the above 
 parties. 
 
 During the summer the insurance company's offer was 
 accepted and this threatened law-suit was settled with- 
 out a fight. When this was out of the way and the 
 buildings had been fairly started, I went over to Cali- 
 fornia, to inspect its wheat fields and other agricultural 
 resources for the British Government. As said in a pre- 
 vious article, I am afraid to re-read my report. Better 
 let sleeping dogs lie. In early October I went out to 
 Iowa to inspect a lot of land bought by the Scottish 
 American Land Co. Those lands were near Emmetsburg 
 and were purchased at $5.00 per acre. The Scotch 
 
 [48] 
 
Company sold them at a small advance. Now they are 
 selling from $75.00 to $125.00 per acre. These are the 
 chances you miss when you have a slim pocket-book. 
 Later in the fall Hope and I attended the Fat Stock 
 Show on the Chicago lake front. There was a bitter 
 fight going on amid the beef breeds and notwithstanding 
 John G. Gillette and other Shorthorn breeders' valiant 
 efforts, the premier breed was getting the worst of it. 
 Many an hour during the summer nights, when we were 
 in the lots or pastures at Bow Park, Hope and I had 
 discussed the question of making a show at the above 
 place. We had the material not only in our own herd, 
 but Ontario then, as now, was prohfic in good cattle. 
 It only needed an effort and at the above show we made 
 a study of the situation. We looked upon the matter 
 as a very serious one, Hope especially, and we used to 
 ponder over it, then discuss it and lay plans as if we 
 were building air castles. Richard Gibson used to come 
 along and added fuel to the flame. We had lots of 
 visitors in those days and although they did not buy 
 much, they talked Shorthorn and encouraged us to make 
 an effort either with our breeding cattle or to produce 
 some steers that would make our neighbors in the States 
 sit up and take notice. You had to sacrifice a bull calf 
 to attain this end and as we were optimistic on the 
 value of good young bulls, more especially if they were 
 red ones, for the coming years we did not see our way 
 to follow up the plans we had in mind. The red craze 
 was at its height and all our efforts were to produce 
 cattle of this color. A lot of arrant nonsense it was, 
 but you had to suit your trade. All our stock bulls 
 were red but the 4th Duke. He was a rich roan, pro- 
 ducing mostly reds. We had a very fine cow, Kirklev- 
 ington Duchess of Horton, in calf to the 4th Duke. She 
 was a light roan, exceedingly rich in flesh, and while not 
 
 [49] 
 
a show cow she was big, roomy, broad over her loins and 
 a very attractive head. She had a grand constitution, 
 apt to run to flesh, but good at the pail — a fine type of 
 a general purpose cow. The story of this union we will 
 fuUy relate later on. 
 
 Previously we have but slightly referred to the Fat 
 Stock Show on the Lake Front. The big drafty, badly 
 arranged Coliseum was an historic place. It was used 
 politically, socially and commercially. There "the battle 
 of the breeds" really took place. It was the meeting 
 place of warriors who championed their favorites. It was 
 a conflict betwixt red and roan, whiteface and black; or, 
 in other words. Shorthorn, Hereford and Aberdeen-Angus. 
 The rivalry was not only acute but it many times almost 
 led up to blows. The Western rangeman, a great cus- 
 tomer for young bulls, was wedded to the Hereford. 
 This gave the breeders of the whitefaces a great pull. 
 The Shorthorn men did not get much of a support from 
 any class. The average farmer was poor and did not 
 invest heavily in pure-bred stock. Further still, the red 
 craze had produced a lot of paper-skinned animals not 
 fitted to the rough usage of the Western range. The 
 armour of the premier breed was weak and easily pierced. 
 John G. Gillette, the greatest producer of commercial 
 cattle in this or any other country, except in later days 
 in the Argentine, had to fight almost alone on the Short- 
 horn side. I have never seen before nor since such mar- 
 velous steers as he produced on his Illinois farms. He 
 was to the Central States what Goodnight was to the 
 Panhandle and Kohrs to Montana in the early days of 
 the range business. Another load the Shorthorn had to 
 carry was a divided camp. The Scotch cattle were being 
 exploited. It made a division in the camp and neither 
 side was inclined to take up the fight. Hope and I 
 
 [SO] 
 
stood round the ring and watched the struggle. The 
 Hereford men were aggressive, going even further than 
 that, but this is not the place to take up such details. 
 
 The Aberdeen-Angus men were more or less passive. 
 They bided their time. They knew that below those 
 black skins lay the best marbled carcass and without any 
 great effort on their part they hold their own on the 
 block. When we got back to Bow Park we had taken 
 up the matter as a sort of personal fight. Hope, when 
 he got his pipe lighted and had mixed a glass of grog as 
 a night cap, waxed eloquent on the enormity of letting 
 Hereford fellows have their own way and naturally this 
 carried me along. Over and above it was a pleasant 
 work to take hold of. We were organizing rapidly on 
 the farm. We had got into an easier position financially. 
 Winter had set in early but we were prepared for it. 
 The old policy of having your work continually pursuing 
 you was changed. We forestalled our requirements and 
 went into the winter of 1880-81 in splendid shape. 
 
 On the 5th January, 1881, I married Miss Euphemia 
 Forrest, who had been brought up at Woodstock, 
 Ontario, but at this time was living at Highland Park, 
 Illinois. During January, February and March we lived 
 at the Kirby House in Brantford. It was kept then by 
 a Mr. Palmer, a rare host who kept a clean house and 
 a splendid table, charging his guests a very moderate 
 sum per month. These months intensified my admira- 
 tion of Canadian society, more especially of the smaller 
 towns in Ontario. The foundation stock of these people 
 was mostly British. The fancy Englishman, the dour, 
 yet wide-awake Scot, the erratic Irishman made a fine 
 blend, and the women folks were a healthy, thrifty, 
 fairly educated class. Housekeeping, more or less a lost 
 art in the States, was born in them. It was part of 
 their nature and made life in those pleasant places run 
 
 [51] 
 
smoothly and without any friction. In all these towns 
 there was a fine social atmosphere. Brantford was espe- 
 cially blessed in having such people as the Yateses, the 
 Stratfords, the Hardys, the Wilkeses, the Cockshutts, the 
 Waterhouses, the Robertsons, the Mortons, the Hen- 
 woods, the Phillipses, the Hateleys, the Digbys, the 
 Osbornes, the Jaffreys, the Wattses, the Cochranes, and 
 many others. There was much entertaining and life 
 flowed easily. Alexander Robertson, manager of the 
 Bank of British North America, was a bachelor in these 
 days, although he married happily after I left the above 
 town. He was a unique character. He was a small 
 man, an exceedingly careful banker, a fit representative 
 for the old fashioned institution he served. Scotch 
 through and through with a fine vein of humor and 
 sentiment under the funny little wig that covered a well 
 made head. In his social hours he was the happiest, mer- 
 riest talker, somewhat long winded at times but genu- 
 ine, rich in anecdote and experience. Coming as I did 
 from a Scotch farm and being planted as manager on 
 a Canadian one, your social position was a little uncer- 
 tain. You were in a way neither fish nor flesh, grass nor 
 hay. The Browns had never taken much interest in 
 Brantford society and John Hope scarcely ever entered 
 a private house. He had no leaning towards what the 
 world terms fashion and feathers. But the ordinary man 
 or woman does badly without it; I caJnnot remember 
 how or why I foregathered with Robertson, but it was 
 a fortunate day for me. We became the greatest friends 
 and we spent endless hours together. It led on to join- 
 ing the charmed circle of Brantford society. It was when 
 you knew it a wide open one, for it was merit more than 
 money that ruled it. There was no great show, little 
 excess, but a lot of fun and genuine good spirit. Rob- 
 ert Henry was the Mayor of the city, a clever, clean, 
 progressive man who made things pleasant to strangers 
 
 [52] 
 
and guided the city affairs with great skill. Dr. Coch- 
 rane was the Presbyterian minister. He was a bundle 
 of nerves and the busiest bee in the town, an excellent 
 preacher with a broad mind and he held together a very 
 large and influential congregation. In addition to pri- 
 vate social gatherings, there were a good many semi- 
 public gatherings. The St. Andrews' Society had a strong 
 hold and not only held its armual dinner, but the members 
 turned out in force at the Robert Burns Anniversary. I 
 had been asked to propose the "Immortal Memory" and 
 had given a good deal of thought to the speech. Then 
 an idea struck me. Mr. Goff, the architect, was a 
 remarkable exponent of Scotch song. He had a lovely 
 voice. Why not express in song some of the sentiments 
 of Burns as an example of the speech I had to make. As 
 usual the best laid schemes, etc., etc. — I got along fairly 
 well with my carefully prepared oration and about the 
 middle of it called on Goff to sing a song. He gave the 
 audience either "My Nannie's Awa," or "Sweet Afton." 
 Being in splendid voice he made a wonderful impression 
 on the audience who were by this time considerably 
 warmed up by hot Scotch and other hquids. Then he 
 was called for an encore and sang "Scots wha hae wi' 
 Wallace bled." I have never seen such a scene before 
 or since. The effect seemed to be electric. One or two 
 of the enthusiasts jumped on the table, napkins were 
 waved, the glasses danced in reckless confusion, men 
 threw their arms round one another's neck and a scene 
 of wild excitement lasted for ten or fifteen minutes. 
 Then the pipes began to skirl and the audience broke 
 into dancing. It was all over for that night for speech 
 making and my peroration carefully composed and worked 
 up in house and barn at Bow Park went to the dump 
 pile. Goff's beautiful voice treated me rather unkindly, 
 but it was probably as well for the audience. I stayed 
 with my friend Robertson that night and inflicted upon 
 
 [53] 
 
him the undelivered portion of the speech. Thirty years 
 after I delivered my Burns' oration to a lot of enthusi- 
 astic Borderers at Coldstream, Scotland. I left out the 
 singing part of the program and Lord Dunglass, now the 
 Earl of Home, who was in the chair, was kind enough to 
 say it came up to standard. At least, it started the ball 
 rolling that night and we had a splendid evening of story, 
 song and sentiment. 
 
 I was present at another dinner of a most interesting 
 nature. It was given by the people of Brantford and 
 vicinity to Dr. Bell of telephone fame. His father and 
 uncle had settled near to Brantford on the banks of the 
 Grand River to spend in pleasant places the evening of 
 their Ufe. BeU had stayed there more or less and had 
 partly perfected his great invention at their home, many 
 of the early experiments being made there. The Brant- 
 ford folks still think with pride of their by-name, "the 
 Telephone City." It was a large and splendid gather- 
 ing. The older Bells were fine elocutionists, while the 
 inventor had an easy way of telling his story. In a way 
 it was a pathetic farewell for us. The son had deter- 
 mined to go; the father and uncle made up their mind 
 to follow. And while Brantford could not object, they 
 felt sorry to see them leave. As I recollect, the speak- 
 ing was of a high order, among the toasts being one to 
 agriculture to which I responded. 
 
 Ontario is dry nowadays, but it was wet in those days 
 I write of. Under the Scott act most of the surrounding 
 towns were dry. Brantford, more especially on Satur- 
 days, got a great influx of farmers and others who 
 enjoyed themselves immensely. Even in the town of Kelso, 
 Scotland, near where I was brought up, although in old 
 days they had about forty public houses to a population 
 of 4,000 souls, they could not touch the above town for 
 the liquor consumed. And it was done in a quiet, easy, 
 respectable way. In the market, which was a hive of 
 
 [54] 
 
industry Saturday forenoons, we used to deal for the farm 
 with a butcher who shall be nameless. During the fore- 
 noon he must have got away with a score of drinks and 
 yet in the afternoon if you met him he looked and acted 
 sober as a judge. Bob Phillips, our farm teamster, who 
 did most of the marketing, had also a wonderful capacity 
 in this way. He never forgot an errand and landed his 
 load safely, although imbibing very freely; on the other 
 hand, our farm men were an exceedingly sober, thrifty 
 lot and we had no trouble with them. In the private 
 homes there was also a lot of conviviality; not boisterous, 
 but persistent. But as I recollect there was no excess 
 and you went home at a respectable hour. 
 
 Another gala day of sport and pleasure was the 24th 
 of May — good old Queen Victoria's birthday. In the 
 three years I lived at Brantford there were a lot of very 
 clever fellows connected with the banks and other busi- 
 ness establishments. They were forceful not only in their 
 work, but in their off hours. Naturally I dropped into 
 the bunch and one of the great stunts of the year hap- 
 pened on the above day. The afternoon previous two 
 or three boats and several canoes were loaded on a wagon 
 and sent up to Gait. This town is on the Grand River. 
 We went up by the evening train to that point and spent 
 rather a merry night. In the morning we put our boats 
 into the river and commenced our trip down stream. 
 Most of these Canadian boys were good canoe men and 
 it was wonderful how they managed to find their way 
 down the swift running channel studded with rocks and 
 boulders. At many places the trees hung over the river 
 and we would drop into shady nooks. It was delightful 
 paddling or rowing gently down stream. We had to run 
 the dam at Paris and below it we lunched on a grassy 
 bank a mile or two beyond that picturesque little town. 
 All the way the banks are beautifully wooded with 
 glimpses of meadow lands and pleasant homesteads. 
 
 [55] 
 
Days those to be remembered. Such as the above were 
 spent among the woods, on rippling rivers, under clear 
 skies mottled now and again with fleecy clouds. Grad- 
 ually the tall spires of Brantford came in view and down 
 the long lake of calm water made by the dam at that 
 point you reached the city, its windows flashing back the 
 rays of the fast retreating sun. It seems Uke yesterday 
 that I saw Jim Morton shoot over the apron of the dam 
 into the boiling waters below, his canoe righting itself 
 from its bold plunge and then in the spirit of devilment 
 I sent the boat I was rowing at the same spot, with the 
 ludicrous result that it capsized and I had to struggle to 
 the shore, a wet and decidedly wiser man. That merry 
 band has long ago dispersed, some to the better land, 
 and those days of mimic warfare are only sweet mem- 
 ories. The red splashes of youth and vigorous manhood 
 mellowed by the fast fleeting years, but tinged with no 
 regrets. 
 
 The winter of 1880-81 was cold with lots of snow and 
 good sleighing. At Bow Park by Christmas we were in 
 good shape, our cattle well housed and an abundance of 
 all kinds of feed. While staying in Brantford I spent 
 nearly every day at the farm and sometimes took sup- 
 per there. We had a typical EngUsh housekeeper, an 
 old maid, who eventually came West in our service and 
 died many years ago at her adopted town of Beams- 
 ville, near Hamilton. She took the greatest care of Hope 
 and myself and fortunately when I got married, of my 
 wife. On the 8th of February we had driven down after 
 lunch, having been detained on business in Brantford 
 during the morning, so we stayed to supper. It was a 
 cold, clear night and while the ladies of the party hugged 
 the base burner in the parlor, Hope and I went to the 
 ofi&ce which adjoined the house. We had commenced on 
 some work when James Smith came in with a very sol- 
 emn face and informed us that Kirklevington Duchess of 
 
 [56] 
 
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Horton had just dropped a bull calf and, awful to think 
 of, it was a white one. He had the red craze bad as any 
 of us. So we went out to see this unwelcome arrival 
 and when we got to the box he was born in, he was just 
 getting up on his forelegs seeking for food. He was a 
 lusty chap and white as the snow outside. Poor Hope 
 was terribly disappointed as the mating of the above 
 cow and 4th Duke of Clarence was made with great 
 expectations. We went back to the oflftce and smoked 
 in silence for a bit. Then I plucked up courage and said 
 to Hope: "Now is our chance to train a well bred steer 
 for the Fat Stock Show?" and that evening we struck 
 oil, as it were, when we named him "Clarence Kirklev- 
 ington." The sire and dam were exceeding strong, virile 
 animals. I do not think I ever saw a bull with more 
 vigor than the 4th Duke and yet he was the gentlest, 
 most lovable sort of animal, with great big expressive 
 eyes. "Clarence" had the same expression, even more 
 kindly if that was possible, and from the first was a great 
 pet. When he was slaughtered nearly four years after- 
 wards Sandie Thompson, the herdsman, wept Uke a child 
 and I fancy John Hope kept out of the way. I took 
 care to be away from the building. It may be inter- 
 esting to Canadian readers especially to read the record 
 made by this steer. 
 
 WEIGHT 
 November, 1882, 1,620 lbs. 
 " 1883, 2,045 lbs. 
 
 " 1884, 2,400 lbs. 
 
 WINNINGS AT FAT STOCK SHOW— CHICAGO 
 1882 — Best Shorthorn Steer, one year and under two — First Prize. 
 1883— Best Shorthorn Steer, one year and under three— First Prize. 
 1883— Best Shorthorn Steer, any age— Sweepstakes. 
 1883— Best Steer, two years and under three, any breed, judged by feeders— 
 
 1883— Best Steer, two years and under three, any breed, judged by butchers 
 
 — Sweepstakes. t^. , ti • 
 
 1884— Best Shorthorn Steer, three years and under four— First Prize. 
 1884 — Best Shorthorn Steer, any age— Sweepstakes. 
 1884 — Best Steer, Cow or Heifer in the show— Grand Sweepstakes. 
 1884— Best Carcass, any age or breed— Grand Sweepstakes. 
 
 [57] 
 
Following up this line of enterprise, if we may so call 
 it, and going a little ahead of my story, in the month 
 of October I went up at Hope's suggestion to a breeder 
 who lived some distance north of us on the way to 
 Guelph but whose name I cannot remember. He had 
 a red grade steer, an exceedingly good one, and a pure 
 bred roan cow — Lady Aberdeen. She was a wonderful 
 cow, slightly undersize but nearly perfection in other 
 ways. After some bargaining I purchased the cow as I 
 thought she was the best of the two for show purposes. 
 Hope was anxious to have both, but we had in those days 
 dollars and cents to consider. Anyway we shipped the 
 cow to Chicago in the early days of November, 1881, 
 exhibiting her at the show. She walked through the 
 female classes unchallenged but only got the reserve 
 championship. But she made a great sensation in Shorthorn 
 circles. I am only sorry that I cannot give her breeder's 
 name for he deserved the large share of the credit. 
 
 The summers of 1880 and 1881 were delightful. On 
 the farm the weather both years was favorable; enough 
 of rain and plenty of sunshine; in fact, ideal seasons. 
 Then we had plenty of labor and I never saw a place 
 respond so quickly and kindly to good husbandry as Bow 
 Park. The land had been horribly abused under Mr. 
 Brown's management although it was only an indirect 
 one. The best crop was weeds, more especially foxtail. 
 Further still under the soiling system he persisted in rais- 
 ing rye for summer use in the barns and fodder corn for 
 winter. Both these crops produced ergot which in turn 
 produced abortion; a fatal thing to get into a herd. It 
 was the mission of Hope and myself to counteract this 
 disease, to restore the herd to natural conditions and it 
 meant a change of cropping. This was congenial work. 
 James Patterson now at St. Paul, Minneosta, and whose 
 sons are doing fine work in our agricultural colleges, was 
 
 [58] 
 
farm foreman, a most efl&cient man. As stated above 
 and in other parts of these articles, one of our first jobs 
 was to eradicate weeds. In purchasing vast quantities 
 of hay and straw from farms generally worked by renters 
 we imported a large amount of weeds. Loads of straw 
 came that were a third foxtail. This went into the 
 manure heap in course of time, the seeds lay dormant 
 and being taken straight from the manure pile in the 
 different yards to the fields and spread, there was a grand 
 reproduction of all kinds of rubbish such as foxtail, mus- 
 tard, etc., etc. To obviate this state of affairs we piled 
 the manure in the fields, turned it over so that the seeds 
 would germinate and then covered it with a species of 
 plaster cheaply purchased in that part of the country 
 and thus squelched practically all of the weeds and fixed 
 the ammonia in the manure. Then we cultivated vigor- 
 ously and reaped our reward. Those were busy days but 
 the surroundings were delightful. There was a steady 
 influx of visitors and we were able to sell a few cattle at 
 good prices. There was some light on the horizon 
 although the average Canadian farmer never took kindly 
 to Bow Park. The farm lay hke an ox bow guarded by 
 the Grand River. At the north point of the big bend 
 a canal then out of use led to Brantford, making that 
 town a seaport before the days of railroads. Below it 
 the river was calm, sluggish, with sedgy sides. A cir- 
 cular road in easy lines paralleled the river and access 
 was had to all the fields from this useful highway. Mag- 
 nificent oaks and spreading maple trees were still in great 
 groves when I went there and if you stood on a high 
 point by the river bank it reminded you of some wooded 
 landscape of the English Midlands. If you started out 
 from Brantford to see the farm you had a delightful ride 
 of about four m^es. As you left the city on your right 
 stood the Cockshutt plough factory, on the left the Har- 
 
 [59] 
 
ris harvester buildings, thence across the canal, away by 
 sweet villas and small farms till you crossed the old 
 Cockshutt bridge that spanned the river. Then you 
 turned sharp to your left and followed the top of the 
 bluffs. About a mile or more you came to the gate by 
 the Indian farm and you entered the property. Your 
 way lay among woods, past an old time orchard and gar- 
 den and as you skirted the river bank a hundred feet and 
 more below, your eye wandered away across level mead- 
 ow lands till on a gently rising hillside the sun gilded 
 steeples and the variegated houses of Brantford caught 
 your eye, and then beyond were deep green woods back- 
 ing a panorama that made me think I was once again 
 on Cotswold hills with the deep Severn sun-kissed on 
 summer evenings as it rolled gently past the opposing 
 Welsh hills. One year I lived in a little house on top 
 of the river bank just opposite this scene. In the sum- 
 mer nights after supper it was endless pleasure to watch 
 the close of day. Below was the river sparkling as it rip- 
 pled over a bed of rock and gravel. There was a carpet 
 of greenery that was turning in places to gold and as the 
 great orb of day fled westward a purple hue came over 
 the silent land. If the wind favored you heard the bells 
 of Brantford, otherwise the peace was not broken. This 
 morning as I sit in sound and sight of a plaintive sea 
 and whispering woodlands, there is a misty haze in my 
 eye as I think of those departed scenes rich in fruit, 
 much of which has fallen. In phantom form marches 
 the stately figure of Brown, the broad form of Hope and 
 all the imagery of those halcyon days. 
 
 [60]