Lost in the Backwoods | Page 2

enemy, he received much kind
attention from his excellent hostess and her family, consisting of a
young man about his own age, and a pretty black-eyed lass not more
than sixteen. The widow Perron was so much occupied with other
lodgers--for she kept a sort of boarding-house--that she had not much
time to give to Duncan, so that he was left a great deal to her son Pierre,
and a little to Catharine, her daughter.
Duncan Maxwell was a fine, open-tempered, frank lad, and he soon
won the regard of Pierre and his sister. In spite of the prejudices of
country, and the difference of language and national customs, a steady
and increasing friendship grew up between the young Highlander and
the children of his hostess; therefore it was not without feelings of deep
regret that they heard the news that the regiment to which Duncan
belonged was ordered for embarkation to England, and Duncan was so
far convalescent as to be pronounced quite well enough to join it. Alas
for poor Catharine! she now found that parting with her patient was a
source of the deepest sorrow to her young and guileless heart; nor was
Duncan less moved at the separation from his gentle nurse. It might be
for years, and it might be for ever, he could not tell; but he could not
tear himself away without telling the object of his affections how dear
she was to him, and to whisper a hope that he might yet return one day
to claim her as his bride; and Catharine, weeping and blushing,
promised to wait for that happy day, or to remain single for his sake.
They say the course of true love never did run smooth; but with the

exception of this great sorrow, the sorrow of separation, the love of our
young Highland soldier and his betrothed knew no other interruption,
for absence served only to strengthen the affection which was founded
on gratitude and esteem.
Two long years passed, however, and the prospect of reunion was yet
distant, when an accident, which disabled Duncan from serving his
country, enabled him to retire with the usual little pension, and return to
Quebec to seek his affianced. Some changes had taken place during
that short period: the widow Perron was dead; Pierre, the gay,
lively-hearted Pierre, was married to a daughter of a lumberer; and
Catharine, who had no relatives in Quebec, had gone up the country
with her brother and his wife, and was living in some little settlement
above Montreal with them.
Thither Duncan followed, and shortly afterwards was married to his
faithful Catharine. On one point they had never differed, both being of
the same religion.
Pierre had seen a good deal of the fine country on the shores of Lake
Ontario; he had been hunting with some friendly Indians between the
great waters and the Rice Lake; and he now thought if Duncan and
himself could make up their minds to a quiet life in the woods, there
was not a better spot than the hill pass between the plains and the big
lake to fix themselves upon. Duncan was of the same opinion when he
saw the spot. It was not rugged and bare like his own Highlands, but
softer in character, yet his heart yearned for the hill country. In those
days there was no obstacle to taking possession of any tract of land in
the unsurveyed forests; therefore Duncan agreed with his
brother-in-law to pioneer the way with him, get a dwelling put up, and
some ground prepared and "seeded down," and then to return for their
wives, and settle as farmers. Others had succeeded, had formed little
colonies, and become the heads of villages in due time; why should not
they? And now behold our two backwoodsmen fairly commencing
their arduous life: it was nothing, after all, to Pierre, by previous
occupation a hardy lumberer, or the Scottish soldier, accustomed to
brave all sorts of hardships in a wild country, himself a mountaineer,

inured to a stormy climate and scanty fare from his earliest youth. But
it is not my intention to dwell upon the trials and difficulties
courageously met and battled with by our settlers and their young
wives.
There was in those days a spirit of resistance among the first settlers on
the soil, a spirit to do and bear, that is less commonly met with now.
The spirit of civilization is now so widely diffused, that her comforts
are felt even in the depths of the forest, so that the newly come
emigrant feels comparatively few of the physical evils that were
endured by the earlier inhabitants.
The first seed-wheat that was cast into the ground by Duncan and
Pierre was brought with infinite trouble a distance of