The British Association's Visit to Montreal, 1884 : LettersRayleigh, Clara, Lady
History
The British Association's Visit to Montreal, 1884 : Letters
Rayleigh, Clara, Lady
Canada -- Description and travel; United States -- Description and travel
_Saturday_.--We arrived at Moose Jaw after a very rocking journey,
so bad that I could not sleep, and sat in a chair part of the night; at
last, however, the cold and sleepiness overcame all fear, and I slept in
my bed soundly. We saw lots of Indians in red and white blankets, ugly
and uninteresting creatures. We made acquaintance with the Roman
Catholic Archbishop, who has been travelling in the car next to ours. He
is a French Canadian, but talked English well. He is very pleasant. He
introduced me to two priests, one of whom had been working among the
Indians thirty years. Afterwards he had a talk with John, and remarked
upon my youthfulness to be his mother. Of course, I am always being
taken for his wife, and they seem very much puzzled about it altogether.
_Saturday night, the 20th_.--We reached Calgary after a quieter
night--quite an important city. A good many wooden houses, two or three
churches (I think the congregations must be very small in each), and on
Sunday morning all the inhabitants were out in their best, the men
loafing and smoking about, and quite smart-looking young ladies showing
their finery with great enjoyment, as they do at home. A mounted police
officer drove a pair of good horses to meet some of his men, and there
are cavalry barracks here for them. The train twice a week from Winnipeg
is their only communication with the outer world, so when it arrives
everyone, even from long distances, crowds the platform. We always take
a walk at these resting places, but it is nervous work to go far, as the
train starts without any notice, and they never keep to the time named.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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