Canada -- Description and travel; Canada -- Emigration and immigration
I think it will be better to wait till we see what happens at
Sherbrooke, as by all accounts he could not do better than go to old
Crabtree. I think, with the prospect of his being shortly settled
there, you might write and explain (if possible) the matter of the
introduction--if we are not here they can forward the letter. 8
p.m.--We have just been down to the station to fetch some of our
baggage, having been told that we should have to pay for it if we
let it lie there, and as we did not wish to bestow any portion of
our capital on cabbies, we carried it up. The consequence is I feel
like this [Illustration: Hand bent at wrist.] as Pot would say. The
weather has been that hot since we came. By-the-bye, I meant to say
when I said that we had just been down to the station, that as I
felt so limp from carrying baggage on a hot night, you would have to
put up with bad writing, but I see it's just as good as what I
started with. It would all be better if Henry was'nt writing too--at
the same table I mean--which, being one of the round one-legged
arrangements usually met with in boarding-houses, is scarcely equal
to the weight of eloquence which he brings to bear upon it. I wonder
what he's writing about. You might just let me know what he says
next time you write. He's just bought some new pink paper to write
upon, and has already started several times with a most careful
beginning, so it ought to be something worth hearing. I have
suggested that he should give you his ideas concerning the crops of
this country, but his innate modesty debars him from giving an
opinion on a subject upon which he confesses himself at present
profoundly ignorant, notwithstanding that we went yesterday
afternoon (there being nothing else which could be done,) to the
great Dominion Agricultural Show, as befitted the incipient farmer,
and that I there carefully explained to him the points of interest
of all the exhibits in relation to which I was convinced that he was
as ignorant as myself. I am afraid, however, that he was rather
inclined to treat my explanations with levity, owing to a base and
misleading practice resorted to by the Committee, of hanging up
beside the stalls, though in not very conspicuous places, a
statement of the supposed race or species of each animal. These
prejudicial placards for a long time escaped my notice, so that I
was unable to fortify his perceptions with an account of the
pig-headedness of Agricultural Committees in this respect. The only
thing that I was entirely unable to explain, and the reason for
which I could by no means fathom, was the pertinent enquiry
constantly occurring, "why should one cow be given a first prize and
another none at all," when the only difference to the mind of a just
and impartial observer consisted in the variety of their attitudes
or colour. Being thus baffled in my attempts at edification, we
adjourned to see some niggers manufacturing tobacco.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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