It would perhaps be superfluous to record many of the particular charges which our people laid at the door of the Americans during the war. It is in evidence equally that the Americans laid quite as many sins to our people for their acts, while making forays on United States soil. So far as one may judge there is not any preponderating weight of evidence for either side. It is true we do accuse the Americans of burning the public buildings in York after the taking of the place, when the fort blew up on April 27th, 1813. The author is inclined to think that the Americans should not have applied the torch. On the other hand, we blew up the fort and utterly destroyed many hundreds of Americans in an instant, including their general. The testimony of the great General Sherman, who, in 1865, marched with an army of 70,000 men through Georgia, Alabama, the Carolinas and Virginia, destroying everything in a belt fifty miles wide, and than whom no one was better qualified to judge, was this: “War is hell.” It would have been futile for our people to expect humane war. There are no recriminations to make. In closing the records of the War of 1812 let us realize with our forefathers that peace, blessed peace, came to them and has ever since been with us. God be thanked. CHAPTER IV. Wolves in Upper Canada--Adventure of Thomas Conant--A grabbing land-surveyor--Canadian graveyards beside the lake--Millerism in Upper Canada--Mormonism. Turning to ordinary affairs, we find that at this date our Government helped the settler to exterminate wolves by paying a bounty of about $6 for each wolf head produced before a magistrate. In reference to these ferocious animals, once so plentiful in Canada, an anecdote of the author’s grandfather will be found both interesting and instructive, giving us a true glimpse of the county in 1806. Thomas Conant, whose portrait is found on opposite page, and who was assassinated during the Canadian Revolution on February 15th, 1838 (_vide_ “Upper Canada Sketches,” by the author), lived in Darlington, Durham County, Upper Canada. In the fall of 1806 he was “keeping company” with a young woman, who lived some three miles back from Lake Ontario, his home being on the shore of that great lake. Clearings or openings in the forest were at this time mostly along the lake shore. Consequently, to pay his respects to the young woman, he had to pass through some forest and clearings in succession. It was in November of that year. Snow had not yet fallen, but the ground [Illustration: THOMAS CONANT. Was born at Bridgewater, Mass., in 1782; came to Darlington, Canada, with his father, Roger Conant, in 1792. On February 15th, 1838, during the Canadian Revolution, he was foully massacred by one Cummings (in Darlington), a despatch bearer, of Port Hope, Ont. The assassin was applauded for the act by the Family Compact.]