I am happy to find by a long letter from Mrs. Murray to Colonel Kempt, that you have found the means of enlivening the solitary scene that has so long prevailed at Fort George.  I assure you that we miss you much here, and that the fascinating Mrs. de Rottenburg, with all her charms, has not effaced the very universal regret which your loss occasions in Quebec.

Brigadier Brock to his brother Irving.

    NIAGARA, February 19, 1811.

Nothing can be more considerate, nothing more friendly, than your constancy in writing to me.  Your last letter is dated the 26th November.  What can I say from this remote corner in return for the pleasure I experience at the receipt of your letters?  I have already described my sombre kind of life, but I am sure you will rejoice to hear that my present quiet has been productive of the essential good of restoring my health.  I now consider myself quite re-established; therefore, my good Irving, dispel all your alarms on my account.  I once thought of visiting Ballstown, but, as a trial of the springs there was my chief motive, I gave up the journey the moment I found there was no medical occasion to undertake it.  I do not admire the manners of the American people.  I have met with some whose society was every thing one could desire, and at Boston and New York such characters are, I believe, numerous, but these are the exceptions.  Politics run very high at this moment, but the French faction have evidently the preponderance, and they style themselves republicans!  Was ever any thing more absurd?  A dreadful crash is not far off—­I hope your friends have withheld their confidence in their public stocks.  There have been many failures at New York, and the merchants there are in a state of great confusion and dismay.

I returned recently from York, the capital of this province, where I passed ten days with the governor, (Gore,) as generous and as honest a being as ever existed.  His lady is perfectly well bred and very agreeable.  I found ample recompense in their society for the inconvenience of travelling over the worst roads I ever met with.  The governor was formerly quartered with the 44th in Guernsey, and recollects vividly the society of those days.

I seldom hear from James Brock, who dislikes writing to such a degree, that he hazards the loss of a friend rather than submit to the trouble; and what is strange, when he sets about it he expresses himself happily, and is highly entertaining.

Sir James Craig has triumphed completely over the French faction in the Lower Province.  By their conduct they have fully exemplified the character of their ancestors.  The moment they found they could not intimidate by threats, they became as obsequious as they had been violent.  The house of assembly passed every bill required of them, among others one authorizing the governor-general