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"Change cars here for
Antigonish and the Straits of Canso.”
So sings the veteran conductor of the Intercolonial Railway train
between Halifax and Pictou, as the morning express rushes up to the
bustling station at New Glasgow. The train pauses to allow those of its
passengers to whom the above intimation has reference to collect their
ideas and their impedimenta, and dismount to wait twenty minutes in the
draughtiest of waiting-rooms until the carriages of the Halifax and Cape
Breton Railway come into view. New Glasgow is not a charming place in
which to while away even twenty minutes; but if you come from Pictou or
from Prince Edward Island you must perforce spend six dreary hours here
and are likely to fall into uncomfortable musings.
A few yards from the station an iron bridge spans the small river on
which the town is built; on the other side of this river is a narrow
track, where, at all hours of the day and night, a small, grimy
locomotive, fairly draped in soot, crawls laboriously backwards and
forwards, dragging equally sombre coal-carts.
This is said to be the oldest railway in America. Tradition tells that
two Highlanders, who had never before seen that triumph of modern
mechanism, the locomotive, were once terribly frightened by this
coal-train. They were walking along the road towards New Glasgow when
suddenly, with a hoarse roar followed by a series of short puffs, this
black monster appeared to come out of the earth, and crawled slowly
along in a groove between two banks of ashes, dragging a long line of
“coal-hoppers.” “Seall! seall! Dondill, seall, tiodhlacadh an Diobliail!”
cried Sandy, which being interpreted means, “See! see! Donald, see the
devil’s funeral!”
Besides its great coal-mines New Glasgow boasts of many other thriving
industries, such as glass-works, steel-works, etc. A short distance from
the town, across the line of route of the “devil’s funeral,” is the
Catholic church, and beside it a beautiful convent and schools, telling
of the presence of the good Sisters of Charity, who here do a noble work
among the children of the miners. The church is spacious and handsome,
the style of architecture resembling that of the more modern Anglican
churches.
New Glasgow contains probably the “oldest inhabitant” of the globe. Some
years ago a miner, in detaching coal from a piece of stone in which it
was embedded, broke the stone with his pick-axe. To his amazement out
hopped two live toads. The stone was hollow and contained a little
water, and, as the reptiles had neither mouths nor eyes, it would appear
that they had lived by absorbing the water through the pores of their
skin. One died on its exposure to the air and light; the other lived for
some time, and then, as befitted the scion of such an old family, ended
its days after the manner of the Duke of Clarence, and, still preserved
in spirits of wine, gives evidence that thousands of years ago toads
looked very much the same as do the toads of this Darwinian century.
While we were meditating on all the history of all the ages that might
have been divulged had one of these toads developed a woman’s tongue,
the Halifax and Cape Breton Railway conductor shouts, “All aboard!” and
off we go to the unknown regions of eastern Nova Scotia, ensconced in
one of the cosiest carriages possible. The railway enters Antigonish
County from Pictou County by the Marshy Hope Valley, running along the
base of Beaver Mountain on the south and skirting the southern extremity
of Brown’s Mountain on the north. It emerges from Marshy Hope Valley and
passes by Beaver Meadow on to James’ River, coming in view of a mountain
called the Keppoch. This mountain extends far back into the country, and
upon it are one or two villages and churches or “stations.” After a
while we leave the Keppoch behind and come out into a more smiling
landscape, where the fertile intervales wave their golden grain, and
angry little torrents rush noisily along, clamoring in their eager
escape from their mountain fastnesses. Here and there are wonderful
white hills, with a light tracery of hard-wood throwing their chalky
cliffs into relief. Nearing Antigonish, we see the grand outlines of the
Sugar Loaf, and Brown’s Mountain gleaming russet and gold in the autumn
sunlight, and towering over the sister hills with them keep watch and
ward over this “city of the vale.” Antigonish, the capital of the county
of that name, is as pretty a little town as one would wish to sec. From
New Glasgow the grimy to Antigonish the fair and comely is a sudden and
pleasing transition. The latter is one of those places that are always
clean and neat and orderly. Yet there is one reminiscence that makes me
pause. It is sometimes muddy. But the mud is well-regulated mud: it
seems to stick to the streets and has no foolish ambition leading it to
adhere to garments, and shoes, and door-mats, and floors, as does the
mud of Halifax. One has a feeling that when Antigonish has sidewalks
they will be well-behaved sidewalks, and not tip up nor tilt down, but
run along smoothly and look fresh and new for ages. Without wishing to
belittle the green pastures of the highlands of Nova Scotia, after the
manner of Mr. Warner, I may say that comparatively few people have much
idea of Antigonish or of its eastern boundaries. They might not rush
madly across maritime Canada it sent to look for Baddeck, but until the
last few years this charming route for tourists was almost unknown; and,
as the Boston traveller says in conceited wonderment, when speaking of
the aurora seen in his midnight drive to Port Mulgrave, “these splendors
burn and this panorama passes night after night down at the end of Nova
Scotia, and all for the stage-driver dozing on his box from Antigonish
to the strait!” Then the beautiful Bras-d’Or, and historic Louisburg,
and other charming spots in Cape Breton had not become fashionable, and
Antigonish itself, only accessible by post-roads or schooners, had not
taken her just place among the towns of Canaan.
The population of Antigonish is about two thousand; of these almost all
are of Scotch descent, and the large majority are Catholics—for it is a
cathedral town and the home of the bishop of Arichat. The cathedral of
Antigonish is generally admitted to be the finest ecclesiastical
building in the maritime provinces, second only to the far-famed
cathedral of St. John’s, Newfoundland. It is in the Roman style of
architecture, and is built of blue limestone and brick; it is one
hundred and seventy feet long by seventy feet wide. The arched roof is
supported by Corinthian columns, its white and gold relieved by light
touches of color. The chancel and numerous lancet windows are very fine;
indeed, everything about this cathedral of St. Ninian is on a grand
scale and solid as well as beautiful. On the facade over the main
entrance is graven the Gaelic Tighe Dhe (the House of God) and the house
is worthy of its dedication.
St. Ninian was chosen as the titular saint of Antigonish by Bishop
Plessis in 1812. This prelate, according to his own showing, was very
particular in looking up Scotch saints for his children in Nova Scotia.
St. Ninian was the apostle of the southern Picts; he was the son of a
prince of the Cambrian Britons, and went to Rome in early boyhood. After
many years spent in the holy city he returned home to teach his
countrymen. He built a church at Whittern, now in Galloway, which church
he dedicated to St. Martin, whom he had learned to love in France. There
he reigned as bishop, and from there he converted the Cumbrians and the
southern Picts. He died on the 16th of September, 432. In September,
1874, fourteen hundred and forty-two years after his death, this stately
cathedral of the New World was consecrated and dedicated to his holy
memory.
Beside the massive and beautiful cathedral stands St. Francis Xavier’s
College, a flourishing institution, taught by secular priests of the
diocese. Across the road is St. Bernard’s Convent, one of the most
beautiful houses among the many missions of the Sisters of the
Congregation of Notre Dame. Up on the hill overlooking these religious
institutions towers the palace of the bishop of Arichat. From its
windows the view is beautiful, and the little town is seen in its best
aspect. Here the saintly prelate lives whose wisdom, learning, and
prudence have made him famous—the good and gentle Bishop of Arichat.
From here he rules his immense diocese, containing nearly sixty priests,
spending his leisure moments in literary pifrsuits. The Gaelic catechism
just issued for the use of the diocese is from the pen of Bishop
Cameron.
Little places, like little people, are apt to think too much of
themselves. And such is the case with this little country town. The name
Antigonish signifies in the Mic-mac language River of Big Fish, and the
metaphor may be applied to the towns-people, who in their own estimation
are very big fish indeed. Their several callings are designated by the
definite article: there is the judge, the doctor, the professor, the
banker, and, acme of provincial greatness, the speaker; for the legal
gentleman who bears the proud title of Speaker of the Nova Scotia
Parliament resides in Antigonish. Here law and medicine run riot, as is
the fashion in Canada, and almost every window shows a “shingle” or a
pestle and mortar. The shops are good, both as regards their
architectural merits and the quantity and style of their contents. Lines
of importation get a little mixed sometimes. For instance, I bought a
“high art’’ copy of Blue Beard at a druggist’s ! There is the usual
book-store and fancy emporium—the rendezvous for mild gossip, where, if
one loiters long enough, one may gauge the intellectual and artistic
tastes of the place. Lawn-tennis is much in vogue in Antigonish, and a
love of flowers seems general; the fair white houses rise up in the
midst of blooming gardens, and the tennis and croquet lawns are shaded
by venerable and cool-looking willow-trees, of the kind used by Rhoda
Broughton as reading-retreats for her hoydenish heroines.
A lovely little river runs through the town, and is spanned by one or
two graceful bridges, which must be crossed to gain the most important
spot of this town of thcs, the railway station. Here twice a day is a
scene of hurry and bustle and local importance—a very Babel of English,
Gaelic, and French. “How are you?” and "How’s yourself?” “Ciamar a
thasibh?” and “Ciamar a tha sibh-fein?” and “Comment ga va-t-il?” etc.,
fill the air. There one sees all the celebrities and most of the
oddities. We were fortunate enough to travel with no less a person than
an acquitted murderer. I use the term advisedly; he was certainly
acquitted, but public opinion held him as certainly to be a party to the
murder. Driving towards the station, we saw the poor wretch washing his
hands in the bright ripples of the “Big Fish” River, and possibly
echoing the somewhat profane adjurations of that strong-minded Highland
heroine, Lady Macbeth. Our other fellow-passengers were a poor woman,
very sick and weak, who had travelled home from the far, far West; a
comely dame from Bayfield, which is the seaport of Antigonish, and
distant about nine miles. Another and more frisky matron, on her way to
Sydney, discoursed loudly about the gayeties of Halifax, in whichshe had
been participating; while a pale and serious clergyman, seated opposite,
read his breviary in happy disregard of the latest gossip concerning
Prince George or the comparative merits of the balls given by the
general and the admiral. Behind this priest was a party of French
people—three girls just returning from Boston, who had acquired the
Bostonian accent and added it to their somewhat slender knowledge of
English ; the effect was funny, and became funnier when they recognized
in a stout Acadian, returning from shopping at Antigonish., an old
neighbor who had not acquired “style.” As the train passes through South
River district the view is most beautiful. Cliffs of gypsum edge the
shore, and lovely islets, all of gypsum, dot the water, with here and
there ferns and vines, and little trees bending into the waves, forming
a very fair landscape.
Heatherton was our destination—a tiny village with a most exquisite
church all white and gold and inlaid wood, a gem of delicate and refined
taste. The country round Heatherton is very rich and fertile, and
settled by prosperous farmers, for the most part Chisholms from
Strathglass, in Scotland—men of a clan that, unlike the dwellers in
Antigonish, disapprove of a lavish use of the word the; in fact,
according to the judgment of clan Chisholm, the definite article is
applicable only to four personages: the pope, the queen, the Chisholm,
and the devil! Attached to the parish of Heatherton is the Indian church
of Summerside, where some of the descendants of the once mighty
Souriquois meet several times a year for the exercises of that religion
to which they have been so faithful. There are quite a number of Indian
missions in the diocese, in some of which the red man seems to have
retained his primeval simplicity. A good story is told of a surveyor in
this country who, many years ago, was appointed to lay out some land at
a place called Afton. He ran his lines, and ordered an Indian who was
with him to drive stakes at given points. The Indian, maintaining that
the stake was not in the right place but encroached on the Indian
reserve, wished to drive it further back. The surveyor allowed him to
proceed as best it pleased him; but what was the Indian’s horror, as he
commenced driving the stake, to hear coming out of the innocent-looking
piece of wood the words, “Devil here.” At every stroke, back, clear and
distinct, came the words, “Devil here”! And all along the more distant
line, try where he would, his hammer elicited the same awful refrain.
The trembling red man came back to the surveyor and reported what he had
heard. The surveyor gravely accepted the fact, and suggested that he
should try placing the stakes on the correct line. The Indian did so;
they were hammered in without further trouble, and the Indians were
quite convinced that they were the trespassers. The surveyor, it is
scarcely necessary to say, was an expert ventriloquist.
In this neighborhood they raise an immense number of cattle for the
Newfoundland markets. Within a circle of eight miles are the thriving
parishes of Pomquet (from Pogumkek, an Indian name), a place chiefly
settled by Acadians; and St. Andrews, the home of Father John MacDonell,
a fine old Highlander, who has never preached an English sermon in his
life.
Leaving Heatherton, the train calls at Bayfield, the seaport of
Antigonish. A little further on than Bayfield is Tracadie, another
Acadian settlement on the shore. Tracadie, commercially, is chiefly
celebrated for its oysters; religiously, for the monastery of P.etit
Clairvaux. In a valley about two miles from the railway station live a
large and flourishing community of Trappis monks, who work and pray, and
are proprietors of a valuable and flourishing farm. There are forty-two
in the community, governed by a mitred abbot, from whom we received the
kindest hospitality. About half a mile from the monastery stands what
appears to be a rookery of old and tottering buildings, innocent of
paint and gray with age. It is not inaptly named (if we may say so
without irreverence) the Convent of the Seven Dolors. Within its humble
walls nine poor old women represent a community in its death-agony.
Originally Trappistine nuns, founded by Father Vincent, a Trappist of
holy memory, they did a good work in the neighborhood; but the first
sisters died, and those who replaced them were ignorant of even the
rudiments of learning, unable to read or to write, and without the
knowledge of order and routine necessary for the conduct of a religious
house. So matters went on from bad to worse, until the bishop of the
diocese forbade their receiving any postulants; and the poor old ladies
live on in piety and simplicity, waiting for the summons that will give
to these humblest of God’s servants an exceeding great reward. To
describe the Trappist monastery and convent would take too much space;
yet they are most interesting, the convent especially so. Tracadie has
quite a large colored population, descendants of fugitive slaves who
came to the country in 1814. They are nearly all Protestants.
The next place of interest is Havre-Boucher, so called from the
circumstance of a Quebec captain being obliged to winter there in 1759,
on account of the ice having formed too quickly to allow him egress.
This pretty French village guards the entrance to the Strait of Canso,
the bright waters of Bay St. George laving one of its shores, the swift
tide of the strait flowing past the other.
The people go in for both fishing and farming. Here we were 'entertained
by one of the most hospitable and popular clergymen of the Dominion—the
Rev. Hubert Girroir. His piety and zeal were great, and his love for his
race and their history knew no bounds. Death has since stilled the warm
heart and closed the bright eyes of this fine old man, but his good
deeds outlive him, and his name will long be cherished in the hearts of
the Acadian people.
Few who hrave not travelled in the Highlands of Nova Scotia have any
idea of the large Celtic population scattered over the country from
prosaic Pictou to romantic Louisburg. Antigonish County alone has a
population of eighteen thousand and sixty; of these fifteen thousand
three hundred and thirty-six are Catholics. Some of these people are the
descendants of emigrants, others are descended from the soldiers of the
Highland regiments that were disbanded. With but scant aid from the
government these gallant and indomitable men threw themselves into the
work of clearing the forests and tilling the soil; most of them
soldiers, accustomed to the desultory manner of camp-life, or fishermen
whose daily occupation had been to cast their lines in the misty lochs
of Inverness-shire or hunt for seals in the northern waters of the
Minch, it is wonderful how they succeeded in the new role of
hard-working farmers. They who were contemptuously turned from their
crofts to make room for the Lowland sheep-tenders gave themselves
heartily to the new avocation of agriculturists, and adhered to it with
the tenacity of their race. To-day their descendants are possessors of
“cattle upon a thousand hills,” and have become a power in the land of
their adoption.
Pictou town, a pretty enough place when seen at a distance, has a very
neat little Gothic church and a large and flourishing convent taught by
the Sisters of the Congregation of Notre Dame. The popular parish priest
of Pictou is the brother of the last incumbent, Father Ronald MacDonald,
now bishop of Harbor Grace, Newfoundland. This prelate, during his
ministry at Pictou, built both church and convent, erecting the latter
at his own expense. From Pictou to the boundaries of Antigonish County
the shore, called the “Gulf Shore,” is lined with Highland Catholic
parishes—Merigomish, Lismore, Malignant Brook, and other names of mixed
origin. Malignant Brook, though a name calculated to inspire awe, is a
harmless place enough, and acquired its forbidding cognomen from its
being the scene of wreck of a ship of war called the Malignant. It is
either in connection with Malignant Cove or Lismore that there is a good
story of Indian generosity and taste. The worthy pastor received one
morning a visit from a Mic-mac, who brought him as a present a fine
moose. After thanking the generous donor the good father said: “But how
shall I cook it?” The Indian made answer: “First roast him, then boil
him,” and turned to leave the room; but, struck by a forgotten item in
the recipe, he came back, and, putting his head round the door,
remarked: “More better put a piece of candle with him, father—make him
more richer! ”
Arisaig, the northern parish of Antigonish County, with its districts of
Knoydart and Moidart, was the pioneer settlement, and around its history
is a halo of unwritten deeds of bravery, loyalty, and faith. To quote
from a sermon preached by the Right Rev. Bishop of Harbor Grace when he
was “Father Ronald ” of Pictou:
In 1787 the first Catholic Highlander, the pioneer of faith, took up his
solitary abode in the bosom of the forest primeval which then waved in
unbroken grandeur on these shores."' In the territory included by the
boundaries of the diocese of Arichat Catholics were at that period few
and far between. In November, 1783, the Eighty-second Regiment, which
had a large contingent of Catholics from the western Highlands, was
disbanded at Halifax. None of these, however, had hitherto made their
way thus far to the west. To Hi se forlorn inhabitants of the forest in
a strange land the consolations ol religion were first carried, as often
they had been to others in similar circumstances, by the irrepressible
Irish missionary—a character that perhaps ha 1 never before been more
fully sustained than it was in the present instance by the zealous
Father Jones. This was an Irish Capuchin friar, as learned as he was
pious. Protected by the toleration extended to him by Edward, Duke of
Kent, he publicly exercised the sacred ministry at Halifax unmolested,
and held a vicar-apostolie’s jurisdiction over the extensive region
laved by the waters of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The country, it is
true, had, under the domination of France, an anterior period of
Catholic history dating as far back as 1604. Few of the .colonists of
that period had remained, and fewer were the prospects, from the same
quarter, of future colonization. . . . With the former settlers the
Catholic religion was banished from Acadia, or at least was confined to
the poor, dear, faithful Mic-mac Indians. Thus had the fruits of the
first victory of faith gone. Could they ever again be retrieved? Did the
last hopes of Catholicity in this country expire when the arm of the
Frei ch monarch had become powerless to protect it? No! ‘Behold the hand
of the Lord is not shortened.’ How mysterious are the ways in which h^
brings about the accomplishment of the wise designs of his all-ruling
providence! The invincible Highlanders who, on the memorable 25th of
July, 1758, followed Wolfe to the conquest of the doomed city, were, in
the hands of God, the harbingers of a new, a more glorious, a more
enduring victory for our faith.
“On the restoration of peace in 1763 the Highland regiments were
disbanded and offered by the imperial government free grants of lands in
the most fertile portions of the provinces in which they had so
gallantly served. But their predilections for their native straths and
glens still chained them to the sweet homes of childhood. And who could
find it in his heart to blame them? What son of the heather could of his
free, will exchange his own ‘loved green slopes of Lochaber ’ for the
then inhospitable, unexplored wilds of America? Alas! the time at length
came when the exchange was no longer a matter of choice but of dire
necessity. The heartless chieftain has discovered that the raising of
cattle and sheep affords larger profits than the letting of his lands to
poor tenants, and forthwith he begins to eject them from the cosey
cottages on the mountain where they and their forefathers for centuries
had found shelter. This unpatriotic and inhuman policy was maintained in
1790. The year following saw the full tide of emigration rapidly ebb
away from the 'Misty Isles,’ from the straths, glens, and mountains of
Inverness, from Glengarry, Knoydart, Arisaig, Morar, and Strathglass.
With the prudent forethought so characteristic of their race, these
exiles kept together. Wherever they went they settled down in large
groups. The first arrivals to this country colonized the parish of St.
Margaret’s (Arisaig), and this was the humble beginning of the second
epoch of Catholicity in eastern Nova Scotia. Hither the Highland
immigrants were soon followed by the first Highland priest, the Rev.
James MacDonald, of Morar, and in 179Z their first church was built.”
This Father James left Arisaig: in 1795, and between that date and 1802
the people of St. Margaret’s depended for spiritual care upon Father
Angus McEachern, a missionary priest of Prince Edward Island, and
afterwards the first Bishop of Charlottetown, who now and then visited
them in his canoe. In the year 1802 God sent these faithful people a
priest whose name will live for ever in ail the country side. Rev.
Alexander MacDonald was born in 1754 at Cleanoeg, in Glenspean, in the
braes of Lochaber. He was a man of commanding appearance and a brave and
generous nature. Of him Bishop MacDonald says:
“The dark horizon which had hitherto circumscribed the wavering hopes of
the settlers was at once relieved of its gloom. He inspired them with
his own manly courage and cheered them by the example of his great
powers of endurance. Everything seemed the better and every heart
lighter for his presence.”
For fourteen years this pastor led his flock, ministering, preaching,
exhorting, teaching, and helping them, loved and venerated by all. In
the spring of 1816 he went to Halifax on business, and on the 15th of
April he died in that city.
Deep and heartfelt was the grief of his parishioners, sincere the
sympathy of all who had known the venerable missionary. The admiral on
the station offered tfi send a man-of-war with Father MacDonald’s body
to Arisaig; but, though sensible of the honor intended to be conferred
both by the admiral and the governor, the dead priest’s people declined
the offer. A gallant little band of Highlanders, who had hastened to
Halifax upon hearing that “he whom they loved was sick,” decided that no
strange hands should be the means of conveying their dear soggarth to
his long home. Carrying his loved remains on their faithful shoulders,
those sturdy men started on foot, and night and day, over almost
impassable roads, dense forests, and swollen rivers, they bore all that
was mortal of their best earthly friend until they tenderly laid him to
rest within the shadow of that altar the steps of which he had so often
ascended to offer the Holy Sacrifice for the living and the dead.
Not far from Lochaber is a parish called St: Joseph’s, where, under the
shelter of the Keppoch Mountain, ripples a silvery little lake, its
waves reflecting one of the prettiest country churches to be found in
eastern Nova Scotia. The view from St. Joseph’s Church is singularly
beautiful, with its lake, mountain, and rich intervales stretching away
as far as the eye can reach. In autumn the foliage here is magnificent,
in all the bravery of crimson, russet, and gold. By the shore of St.
Joseph’s Lake is one of those curious conical little hills where the
fairies are said to dwell. A belief in fairies prevailed very generally
among the Highlanders of old, and to this day it exists in the minds of
their descendants. These small, grass-grown hills are named by them
sin-skill, the habitation of a multitude, or sith-canan, from sithf
peace, and dunun, a mound, and here in the gloaming the little people
are supposed to hold their revels. The idea seems to harmonize with the
landscape. The tourist might say with Kilmeny:
"She saw a sun on a summer sky,
And clouds of amber sailing by;
A lovely land beneath her lay,
And that land had glens and mountains gray,
And that land had valleys and hoary piles,
And marled seas and a thousand isles;
Its fields were speckled, its forests green,
And its lakes were all of the dazzling sheen,
Like magic mirrors, where slumbering lay
The sun, and the sky, and the cloudlet gray,
Which heaved, and trembled, and gently swung—
On every shore they seemed to be hung;
For there they were seen on their downward plain
A thousand times and a thousand again,
In winding lake and placid firth,
Little peaceful heavens in the bosom of earth."
The country for several miles around St. Joseph’s is called the “Ohio”,
why, nobody seems to know.
In Antigonish town the first settlement was that of Colonel Hierlihy and
the soldiers of the disbanded Eighty-third Regiment. The government
granted to each soldier one hundred acres of land and provisions for
three years; but after unsuccessful attempts many of these amateur
farmers gave up in despair and left the place. Some of them sold their
clearings; others left without even trying to realize money on their
farms, which were afterwards sold to pay taxes. It is said that in those
days two hundred and fifty acres of land were sold at auction for £2
11s. 1d., and one farm was sold for a suit of clothes!
The principal purchasers were Captain Hierlihy, Edward Irish Baxter,
Ogden Cunningham, and several MacDonalds. To these were added in time
two parties of United States loyalists, one of whom, Nathan Pushee, was
said to be General Washington’s trumpeter. These people underwent great
hardships. Pictou was their nearest market for supplies. There were no
roads, and their only way of getting to it was along the gulf coast.
This journey they often performed on foot. If they possessed a horse it
was attached to a sort of vehicle constructed of two poles, the ends of
which served as shafts; these were connected with a few cross-pieces of
wood. The harness was of straw, and, as a modern historian writes, “Many
an honest countryman preparing to return home had the annoyance to find
that the hungry village cows had eaten the harness off his horse.” As
there were no roads, the meal-sacks were often the victims of the thick
bushes through which they were dragged and it was usual for a driver to
be provided with needles and thread to repair damages. In every possible
way the early settlers suffered inconvenience— from scarcity of horses
and oxen, from want of wool and cotton, from want of roads and mills and
bridges; their sheep, when they got them, were in constant danger from
bears and wild-cats, which infested the forests. These and mosquitoes
were a constant source of annoyance, and one year, 1815, the invasion of
mice became a real plague. They made their appearance in the month of
March, and stood not on the order of their coming, but came in
thousands. The first contingent were succeeded by an army of smaller
ones, and a deadly feud was kept up all summer. It is said that on their
march they packed down the snow, or, in local parlance, “broke the
roads.” A track through the forest at that time was effected by what
they called “blazing it.” The journeys were very arduous. Great economy
was :necessar)* regarding the size and weight of parcels ; the first
’wheat was brought by handfuls, and the man who introduced potatoes
bought a bushel in Pictou, cut the eyes out of them, and ‘‘brought them
home in his pocket. As late as 1817 the mails for the whole of
Antigonish and Guysborough were brought over ’Brown’s Mountain in the
pockets of the postman.
Near what is called the Town Point the early settlers found the remains
of a small chapel, supposed to have been a hundred years old. Age had
destroyed its walls, and the roof had sunk to the earth. Under it was a
subterranean passage leading to the sea. Here were found several images.
Tradition says that the bell, chalice, and vestments belonging to this
church are 1 buried among the plaster caves on the shore, and the
Indians (affirm that on Christmas Eve, when “all things are in quiet
’silence and the night in the midst of her course, the silvery tones of
the bell are heard mingling with the plashing of the waves on the
strand. This church was doubtless a relic of the old Acadian times,
possibly of the pioneer Jesuits, Fathers Richard, Lionne, and Fremin,
who first brought the glad tidings to this Ultima Thule. |
