I enjoyed the fresh breeze from the river along the banks of which our road lay.  It was a fine sight to see the unclouded sun rising from behind the distant chain of mountains.  Below us lay the rapids in their perturbed state, and there was the island of St. Anne’s, bringing to our minds Moore’s Canadian boat song:  “We’ll sing at Saint Anne’s our parting hymn.”

The bank of the St. Laurence, along which our road lay, is higher here than at Montreal, and clothed with brushwood on the summit, occasionally broken with narrow gulleys.  The soil, as near as I could see, was sandy or light loam.  I noticed the wild vine for the first time twining among the saplings.  There were raspberry bushes, too, and a profusion of that tall yellow flower we call Aaron’s golden rod, a solidago, and the white love-everlasting, the same that the chaplets are made of by the French and Swiss girls to adorn the tombs of their friends, and which they call immortelle; the Americans call it life-everlasting; also a tall purple-spiked valerian, that I observed growing in the fields among the corn, as plentiful as the bugloss is in our light sandy fields in England.

At Lachine we quitted the stage and went on board a steamer, a fine vessel elegantly fitted up with every accommodation.  I enjoyed the passage up the river exceedingly, and should have been delighted with the journey by land had not my recent illness weakened me so much that I found the rough roads very unpleasant.  As to the vehicle, a Canadian stage, it deserves a much higher character than travellers have had the candour to give it, and is so well adapted for the roads over which it passes that I doubt if it could be changed for a more suitable one.  This vehicle is calculated to hold nine persons, three back, front, and middle; the middle seat, which swings on broad straps of leather; is by far the easiest, only you are liable to be disturbed when any of the passengers choose to get out.

Certainly the travelling is arranged with as little trouble to the traveller as possible.  Having paid your fare to Prescott you have no thought or care.  When you quit the steam-boat you find a stage ready to receive you and your luggage, which is limited to a certain proportion.  When the portage is passed (the land carriage), you find a steam-vessel ready, where you have every accommodation.  The charges are not immoderate, considering the comforts you enjoy.

In addition to their own freight, the steamers generally tow up several other vessels.  We had three Durham boats at one time, beside some other small craft attached to us, which certainly afforded some variety, if not amusement.