Life in the Clearings versus the BushMoodie, Susanna
History
Life in the Clearings versus the Bush
Moodie, Susanna
Frontier and pioneer life -- Ontario; Moodie, Susannah, 1803-1885; Ontario -- Description and travel
The steamboat again leaves the north shore, and stands across from the
stone mills, which are in the Prince Edward district, and form one of
the features of the remarkable scenery of what is called the "high
shore." This mountainous ridge, which descends perpendicularly to the
water's edge, is still in forest; and, without doubt, this is the most
romantic portion of the bay, whose waters are suddenly contracted to
half their former dimensions, and glide on darkly and silently between
these steep wood-crowned heights.
There is a small lake upon the highest portion of this table-land, whose
waters are led down the steep bank, and made to work a saw-mill, which
is certainly giving a very unromantic turn to them. But here, as in the
States, the beautiful and the ideal are instantly converted into the
real and the practical.
This "lake of the mountains" is a favourite place for picnics and
pleasure trips from Northport and Belleville. Here the Sabbath-school
children come, once during the summer, to enjoy a ramble in the woods,
and spread their feast beneath the lordly oaks and maples that crown
these heights. And the teetotallers marshall their bands of converts,
and hold their cold water festival, beside the blue deep waters of this
mysterious mountain-lake.
Strange stories are told of its unfathomable depth; of the quicksands
that are found near it, and of its being supplied from the far-off
inland ocean of Lake Huron. But like the cove in Tyendenaga, of which
everybody in the neighbourhood has heard something, but which nobody has
seen, these accounts of the lake of the mountain rest only upon hearsay.
The last rays of the sun still lingered on wood and stream when we
arrived at Picton, which stands at the head of the "long reach." The bay
here is not wider than a broad river. The banks are very lofty, and
enclose the water in an oblong form, round which that part of the town
which is near the shore is built.
Picton is a very beautiful place viewed from the deck of the steamer.
Its situation is novel and imposing, and the number of pretty cottages
that crown the steep ridge that rises almost perpendicularly from the
water, peeping out from among fine orchards in full bearing, and trim
gardens, give it quite a rural appearance. The steamboat enters this
fairy bay by a very narrow passage; and, after delivering freight and
passengers at the wharf, backs out by the way she came in. There is no
turning a large vessel round this long half-circle of deep blue water.
Few spots in Canada would afford a finer subject for the artist's pencil
than this small inland town, which is so seldom visited by strangers and
tourists.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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