Och! it’s here I’m intirely continted,
    In the wild woods of swate ’Mericay;
  God’s blessing on him that invinted
    Big ships for our crossing the say!

  Here praties grow bigger nor turnips;
    And though cruel hard is our work,
  In ould Ireland we’d nothing but praties,
    But here we have praties and pork.

  I live on the banks of a meadow,
    Now see that my maning you take;
  It bates all the bogs of ould Ireland—­
    Six months in the year it’s a lake.

  Bad luck to the beavers that dammed it! 
    I wish them all kilt for their pains;
  For shure though the craters are clever,
    Tis sartin they’ve drown’d my domains.

  I’ve built a log hut of the timber
    That grows on my charmin’ estate;
  And an illigant root-house erected,
    Just facing the front of my gate.

  And I’ve made me an illigant pig-sty,
    Well litter’d wid straw and wid hay;
  And it’s there, free from noise of the chilther,
    I sleep in the heat of the day.

  It’s there I’m intirely at aise, sir,
    And enjoy all the comforts of home;
  I stretch out my legs as I plase, sir,
    And dhrame of the pleasures to come.

  Shure, it’s pleasant to hear the frogs croakin’,
    When the sun’s going down in the sky,
  And my Judy sits quietly smokin’
    While the praties are boil’d till they’re dhry.

  Och! thin, if you love indepindence,
    And have money your passage to pay,
  You must quit the ould counthry intirely,
    And start in the middle of May.

J.W.D.M.

CHAPTER XX

DISAPPOINTED HOPES

  Stern Disappointment, in thy iron grasp
  The soul lies stricken.  So the timid deer,
  Who feels the foul fangs of the felon wolf
  Clench’d in his throat, grown desperate for life,
  Turns on his foes, and battles with the fate
  That hems him in—­and only yields in death.

The summer of ’35 was very wet; a circumstance so unusual in Canada that I have seen no season like it during my sojourn in the country.  Our wheat crop promised to be both excellent and abundant; and the clearing and seeding sixteen acres, one way or another, had cost us more than fifty pounds, still, we hoped to realise something handsome by the sale of the produce; and, as far as appearances went, all looked fair.  The rain commenced about a week before the crop was fit for the sickle, and from that time until nearly the end of September was a mere succession of thunder showers; days of intense heat, succeeded by floods of rain.  Our fine crop shared the fate of all other fine crops in the country; it was totally spoiled; the wheat grew in the sheaf, and we could scarcely save enough to supply us with bad, sticky bread; the rest was exchanged at the distillery for whiskey, which was the only produce which could be obtained for it.  The storekeepers would not look at it, or give either money or goods for such a damaged article.