The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1855-12-06

little towns upon Coney and Staten Islands; and
whilst our steamer is landing, the wharf is
swarming with "lords and ladies gay" easily
distinguished from the ha6itanS, whose dress is
the coarse straw hat and rude blouse. But
there is a gentleness in their manners, and a
respectful Difference without servility in their
department, which contrasts strikingly with the
people we see at landings on more southern
shores. If you ask service, they perform it
with cheerfulness and alacrity; but though
there are fifty calashes with their drivers, stand
ing along the street, there is not an act of rude
ness nor a single vociferous shout.
We have often heard the pdtois Of the Cana
dams spoken of with contempt, as a rude jar
gon. But they claim to speak purer French
than the modern Parisians themselves, and say
their idiom is that of the Court of Louis XIV,
and has the classical dignity of the olden time.
The correctness Of this we cannot assert, but a
gentleman, who was educated in Paris, found
no difficulty in conversing with them, and was
inclined to think the language of the uneduca-
ted classes nearly the same in France and the
Canadas. Very sure we are that it is both mu-
steal and amusing; and to know that we are in
an English Province, ruled by Protestant
princes, and see ourselves surrounded by
French people, in the midst of French Gus
toms, while the cross with its crown of thorns
is upon every hilltop and in every valley, indi-
eating that the Catholic religion is universal, is
continual contradiction.
The special object of our trip was to ascend
the Saguenay; and though we had seen the
"Seven Mile Mirror" in which its glories are
reflected, and revelled in many description,
we were not at all prepared for the realities
which rose up before US as we ghded over its
dark waters. Where we leave the st. Law
renee, it is nearly thirty miles broad, and the
Saguenay, in immediate contrast, seemed mar
row stream, although more than two miles in
width. At first, the bluffs and sloping hills re-
minded us of the shores of Lake George, but in
creased in grandeur as we proceeded, till they
stood alone, reminding us of nothing else we
had seen in nature. During the whole seventy
miles, there is not a rod of internal, but noun
tains of every form and size, bold and bleak,
rising directly from the waters edge, obliging
you to look straight up, from fifteen hundred
to ten thousand feet
Where the wind sweeps across the bluffs,
they are bold, and the pines, which should be
grand and waving forest trees, are naked stu66s,
without sign of verdure. Here and there
upon rock, or in a wild ravine, is seen a fish
erman's hut, or the temporary sheds of lumber
men but all else is solemn grand, and still.
We do not see bird, or hear single sound
of life. The water is black, and so deep that
no line has fathomed it; and the cold is so in
tense, that furs and all the woollens of January
are but slight protection against the piercing
blasts. Trout are said to be abundant in the
bays, and seals splash lazily upon the surface
AS the steamer upon which we are is only a
pleasure boat, we move slowly along, pausing
at every spot of interest, where silvery stream
threads its noiseless way through the fringes of
a sunny glade, a waterfall dashes down the
gorge, or the ST. Marguerite flows quietly down,
to mingle its bright waters with the dark waves
of the Saguenay.
We moor in Ha-ha Bay, which is the Indian
for Laughing WaterS; and here, upon the more
gently sloping hills we find little village-a
church, a school-house, and sawmill-with its
sound of busy life. Here, too, are harvests
waving in rich luxuriance. Again, with a
French courier, a Canada pony, and the light
calash, we drive through the principal street,
cross the crystal brook upon its pebbly bed,
while on the bank the kline are grazing, and
merry maidens are bleaching, and stop at a little
repository of "tobacco, sugar, tea, and rum"
layers in this northern cline. There does not
seem to us to be supply for single family !;
and we find nothing but birchen basket of
domestic manufacture to treasure for a souve-
mir of this far-off and peculiar people.
Our driver can speak little English, and we
ask him if the crops are good this season and
are assured that there is "plentv Of every ting,
plenty oats, plenty barley, plenty soheat and
potatoes, plenty ecery ting" But we cannot
imagine where this plenty is produced.
On our return, we are fog bound for many
hours in Lance PEau Bay, near the mouth of
the river, where we see the little church first built
in Canada, in 1908, the same year in which
Quebec was founded, and On the st. Lawrence
encounter fearful storm but at length, as
said, found ourselves safely moored in the har-
Dor of Quebec.