Pictures of Canadian Life: A Record of Actual Experiences — John Shaqi
Pictures of Canadian Life: A Record of Actual ExperiencesRitchie, J. Ewing (James Ewing)
History
Pictures of Canadian Life: A Record of Actual Experiences
Ritchie, J. Ewing (James Ewing)
Canada -- Description and travel; Canada -- Emigration and immigration
As to myself, I need not assure you I was glad enough to find myself in a
Pullman car, bound for Montreal. I shed no tears as we left Quebec far
behind, and glided on under a cloudless, moonlit sky, serenaded by those
Canadian nightingales, the frogs. At first I felt a little difficulty in
retiring to rest. As a modest man, I was inclined to object to the
presence of so many ladies, although we had been on the best of terms
during our voyage out. It is true that they had their husbands with
them, but nevertheless I felt uncomfortable, and vowed I would retreat to
the smoking-room. However, I was over-persuaded, and lay down with the
rest; though more than once that eventful night I was awoke by awful
sounds, reminding me rather of the hoarse roar of the Atlantic in a storm
than of the peaceful slumbers of a Pullman car.
CHAPTER IV.
AT MONTREAL, AND ON TO OTTAWA—INTERVIEWING AND INTERVIEWED.
One discovery I have made since I have been here is that Canada has its
clouded skies and its rainy days, and that a Canadian spring may be quite
as ungenial as an English one. Yet it is, I still see, the country for a
working man. And I write this in full knowledge of the fact that here at
Montreal the charitable, on whom the poor depend—for there is no poor-law
in this country, and let us hope, seeing what mischief has been done by
poor-laws, there may never be one—have been sorely exercised this winter
how to feed the hungry, and to clothe the naked, and to find the outcast
a home. But, mind you, I only recommend the place for the poor
agricultural labourer or artisan; and already I find the larger portion
of such who have come out with me are in full work, and are thankful that
they have come, but they had to take anything that was offered. It is
clear this is not the country for clerks and shop-lads, and the secretary
of the Young Men’s Christian Association—which I find here to be a
flourishing institution—writes:
‘Young men are coming by each steamer. Many of them are introduced to us
with excellent recommendations, and have occupied good positions in
England. Some have left their situations on the representation of
railway and steamboat agents as to the opportunities in this country. We
find it absolutely impossible to secure employment for them in many
cases, business in every department has been so dull. Almost all the
houses have been employing hands that they could dispense with. Reports
from the West show the market glutted as bad as in Montreal.’ And I fear
things have not improved since.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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