How long I slept I knew not: they roused me suddenly to tell me we were at Toronto, and, not very well able to stand, I hurried on deck. The wharf was utterly deserted, the arrival of the steam-boat being accidental and unexpected; and as I stepped out of the boat I sank ankle-deep into mud and ice. The day was intensely cold and damp; the sky lowered sulkily, laden with snow, which was just beginning to fall. Half-blinded by the sleet driven into my face and the tears which filled my eyes, I walked about a mile through a quarter of the town mean in appearance, not thickly inhabited, and to me, as yet, an unknown wilderness; and through dreary, miry ways, never much thronged, and now, by reason of the impending snow-storm, nearly solitary. I heard no voices, no quick footsteps of men or children; I met no familiar face, no look of welcome!--Up to the present hour all objects wear one hue. Land is not distinguishable from water. I see nothing but snow heaped up against my windows, not only without but within; I hear no sound but the tinkling of sleigh-bells and the occasional lowing of a poor half-starved cow, that, standing up to the knees in a snowdrift, presents herself at the door of a wretched little shanty opposite, and supplicates for her small modicum of hay. * * * * * The choice of this site for the capital of the Upper Province was decided by the fine harbour, the only one between Burlington Bay and Cobourg, a distance of about a hundred and fifty miles. General Simcoe, the first governor after the division of the two provinces, and a man of great activity and energy of character, entertained the idea of founding a metropolis. At that time the head quarters of the government were at Niagara, then called Newark, on the opposite shore; but this was too near the frontiers to be a safe position. Nor is Toronto much safer: from its low situation, and the want of any commanding height in the neighbourhood, it is nearly defenceless. In case of a war with America, a few boats sent from the opposite coast of New York could easily lay the fort and town in ashes; and, in fact, during the last war, in 1813, such was the fate of both. But the same reasons which rendered the place indefensible to us, rendered it untenable for the enemy, and it was immediately evacuated. Another objection was, and _is_, the unhealthiness of its situation,--in a low swamp not yet wholly drained, and with large portions of uncleared land immediately round it: still the beauty and safety of the spacious harbour, and its central position about half-way between Lake Huron and the frontier line of Lower Canada, have fixed its rank as capital of the province and the seat of the legislature.[2]