Wild gooseberry, red and black currants, apple-trees, with here and there a standard hawthorn, the native tree bearing nice red fruit I named before, are all I have as yet been able to introduce.

The stoup is up, and I have just planted hops at the base of the pillars.  I have got two bearing shoots of a purple wild grape from the island near us, which I long to see in fruit.

My husband is in good spirits; our darling boy is well, and runs about everywhere.  We enjoy a pleasant and friendly society, which has increased so much within the last two years that we can hardly regret our absence from the more populous town.

My dear sister and her husband are comfortably settled in their new abode, and have a fine spot cleared and cropped.  We often see them, and enjoy a chat of home—­sweet, never-to-be-forgotten home; and cheat ourselves into the fond belief that, at no very distant time we may again retrace its fertile fields and flowery dales.

With what delight we should introduce our young Canadians to their grandmother and aunts; my little bushman shall early be taught to lisp the names of those unknown but dear friends, and to love the lands that gave birth to his parents, the bonny hills of the north and my own beloved England.

Not to regret my absence from my native land, and one so fair and lovely withal, would argue a heart of insensibility; yet I must say, for all its roughness, I love Canada, and am as happy in my humble log-house as if it were courtly hall or bower; habit reconciles us to many things that at first were distasteful.  It has ever been my way to extract the sweet rather than the bitter in the cup of life, and surely it is best and wisest so to do.  In a country where constant exertion is called for from all ages and degrees of settlers, it would be foolish to a degree to damp our energies by complaints, and cast a gloom over our homes by sitting dejectedly down to lament for all that was so dear to us in the old country.  Since we are here, let us make the best of it, and bear with cheerfulness the lot we have chosen.  I believe that one of the chief ingredients in human happiness is a capacity for enjoying the blessings we possess.

Though at our first outset we experienced many disappointments, many unlooked-for expenses, and many annoying delays, with some wants that to us seemed great privations, on the whole we have been fortunate, especially in the situation of our land, which has increased in value very considerably; our chief difficulties are now over, at least we hope so, and we trust soon to enjoy the comforts of a cleared farm.

My husband is becoming more reconciled to the country, and I daily feel my attachment to it strengthening.  The very stumps that appeared so odious, through long custom, seem to lose some of their hideousness; the eye becomes familiarized even with objects the most displeasing till they cease to be observed.  Some century hence how different will this spot appear!  I can picture it to my imagination with fertile fields and groves of trees planted by the hand of taste;—­all will be different; our present rude dwellings will have given place to others of a more elegant style of architecture, and comfort and grace will rule the scene which is now a forest wild.