Yet it was to such a life Major Traill took his handsome and accomplished wife; but Mrs. Traill in her backwoods settlement was not forgetful of the literary vocation to which she had dedicated her early youth. I have already referred to her ‘Backwoods of Canada’; that was in due time followed by a volume equally worthy of public favour, under the title of ‘Ramblings in a Canadian Forest.’ Indeed, she and her sister may claim to have been the pioneers of Canadian literature; and their brother, Lieutenant-Colonel Strickland, may also claim to be placed in that category by his work, ‘Twenty-seven Years in Canada West,’ a record of his own experiences, abounding with numerous realistic touches. He settled his family near his sister; and at Lakefield, near Peterborough, the residence of Mrs. Traill, there is quite a colony of Stricklands, who have all done well, so people tell me, at the lumber trade. I am glad I paid Mrs. Traill a visit. It was a long and wearisome ride, but I was well repaid by a short interview with one with whom I was familiar half a century back. Lakefield is a charming spot, and Mrs. Traill’s wooden but picturesque cottage overlooks a lovely scene of trees and hills, and water and grass. At any rate, in the early spring it has a neat little garden; in new countries neat little gardens are rare. Mrs. Traill has seen great changes in her time. When she came there, there were only one or two houses in Peterborough; all was forest, and now it has a mayor and a town-hall, and is one of the nicest towns in that part of Canada. Mrs. Traill’s cottage is fitted up with English comfort and taste. She has around her books and photographs of loving relatives. She showed me a book of hers recently published by Messrs. Nelson and Sons. As a Canadian authoress, she has done much to commemorate the beauty of Canadian forests, and writes of their floral charms with all the tenderness and grace with which I remember her sketches of East Anglian rural life were richly adorned. She is now hard at work with a new volume on Canadian lichens and flowers. As we stood talking at the window—the sunbeams played gaily on the blue waters of the lake or river beneath (in Canada there are so many rivers and lakes that you can scarcely tell which is which, or where the one ends or the other begins)—fairy flowers were beginning to gem her lawn; and the American robin redbreast, a far larger bird than ours, and other birds, still more graceful, flew among the trees—I felt how, in such a spot, one weary of the world could lead a tranquil life.