The very term, stage-coach, suggests to our minds a spanking four-in-hand, in brass-mounted harness, attached to a gayly-decorated conveyance. We picture them dashing through a village under the crack of the coachman’s whip. Away they go, rattling over the bridge, down the turnpike, and with a shrill blast of the guard’s horn, they haul up at the wayside inn, where a fat and smiling landlord escorts the passengers in to a hot dinner. Such were not the stagecoaches of our forefathers; they were simply lumber wagons without springs and covered with canvas like the prairie schooners, or plain wooden enclosures with seats suspended by leather straps. Just think of being cooped up in such an affair from sunrise to sunset—the clumsy "coach" jolting over the rough roads, dodging stumps, rocks, and fallen trees, plunging down a steep embankment, fording rivers and streams, and sinking now and then to the axles in mud! During the summer months the mosquitoes and black flies added to the misery of the travellers. Even so, in this, as in all things, the pioneers looked not so much on the dark side of life as on the bright. The distance had to be covered; every jolt and bump brought them one step nearer their destination. The tales of the fellow travellers were entertaining and helped to shorten the way. Perhaps one was a legislator just returning from a meeting of the House, perhaps a merchant on his way to Montreal to make his year’s purchase of goods, or a young adventurer from the old country spying out an opportunity to better himself in the New World. The forest had its charms, although the insects at times were abominable. As the coach passed through a clearing the yeoman, with a swing of his hat, would wish the travellers God-speed. The monotony was broken, time and again, by a glimpse of a bay or lake; and the road, in places followed the beach, where the waves broke under the horses’ feet. Awaiting them at the journey’s end were that rest and peace which the home alone can afford, that bright welcome of the fireside built with their own hands, and the smiles of the loved ones who had shared all their trials and victories. *CHAPTER IV* *EARLY COURTS AND ELECTIONS*