Many years after this, another phenomenon not less wonderful occurred, which I had the satisfaction of seeing; and although forty-five years have elapsed, the terrifying scene is as firmly fixed in my memory as though it had happened but an hour ago. I refer to the meteoric shower of the 13th of November, 1833. My father had been from home, and on his return, about midnight, his attention was arrested by the frequent fall of meteors, or stars, to use the common phrase. The number rapidly increased; and the sight was so grand and beautiful that he came in and woke us all up, and then walked up the road and roused some of the neighbours. Such a display of heaven's fireworks was never seen before. If the air had been filled with rockets they would have been but match strokes compared to the incessant play of brilliant dazzling meteors that flashed across the sky, furrowing it so thickly with golden lines that the whole heaven seemed ablaze until the morning's sun shut out the scene. One meteor of large size remained sometime almost stationary in the zenith, emitting streams of light. I stood like a statue, and gazed with fear and awe up to the glittering sky. Millions of stars seemed to be dashing across the blue dome of heaven. In fact I thought the whole starry firmament was tumbling down to earth. The neighbours were terror struck: the more enlightened of them were awed at contemplating so vivid a picture of the Apocalyptic image--that of the stars of heaven falling to the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken by a mighty wind; while the cries of others, on a calm night like that, might have been heard for miles around. Young and poor as Canada was half a century ago, she was not behind many of the older and more wealthy countries in enterprize. Her legislators were sound, practical men, who had the interest of their country at heart. Her merchants were pushing and intelligent; her farmers frugal and industrious. Under such auspices her success was assured. At an early day the Government gave material aid to every project that was calculated to foster and extend trade and commerce, as well as to open up and encourage the settlement of the country. Neither was individual enterprize behind in adopting the discoveries and improvements of the time, and in applying them not only to their own advantage but to that of the community at large. Four years after Fulton had made his successful experiment with steam as a propelling power for vessels on the Hudson, a small steamer was built and launched at Montreal; and in 1815 the keel of the first steamer that navigated the waters of Upper Canada was laid at Bath. She was named the _Frontenac_.