Laura Secord, the heroine of 1812 Part 36

"_Captain of the United States Light Artillery_.

"Acceded to and signed,

"P. G. BOERSTLER,

"_Lieut.-Col. commanding detachment United States Army_.

"P. V. DE HAREN,

"_Major Canadian Regiment_."

--_Auchinleck's History of the War_, p. 175.

NOTE 39, page 65.

The golden epaulettes.

These were the insignia of a captain's rank in those days, and as Major De Haren is made to predict, Lieutenant Fitzgibbon won his company by the exploit of Beaver Dam.

A BALLAD OF 1812.

NOTE 1, page 70.

Irresolution ruled.

Proctor's irresolution, timidity, or want of promptness, led to many disasters, notably that at Moraviantown, and at length was his own destruction.

NOTE 2, page 70.

Our people, by forced parole held.

James says, "No sooner had the American Army got possession of the Niagara frontier [27th May, 1813] than officers with parties were sent to every farmhouse and hovel in the neighbourhood to exact a parole from the male inhabitants of almost every age. Some were glad of this excuse for remaining peaceably at their houses, and those who made any opposition were threatened to be sent across the river, and thrown into a noisome prison."

NOTE 3, page 72.

The substance all too poor and spa.r.s.e Our stinted fields may grow.

The war was declared on the 18th of June, and at once every able male in the Provinces sprang to arms. The necessary absence from their farms thus forced upon them curtailed the sowing, and lessened the harvest, though the women and children of every rank did their utmost to countervail the losses thus threatened. The next year there was less to sow and less, consequently, to reap, notwithstanding the leave granted to the militia at all possible junctures, to attend to their work; but intermittent farming is not more successful than other occasionally prosecuted labour, and the war laid bare many previously fruitful clearings.

NOTE 4, page 73.

Or many-rattled snake.

An extraordinary danger attended the bite of the rattlesnake in the case of a married woman. The Jenny Decow alluded to in Note 23 had become Mrs. McCall, and while working in the field with her husband was bitten.

Her husband killed the snake, thinking, according to the ideas of the time, that by so doing he should save his wife's life; he also sucked the poison from the wound; but before he had carried her to her cottage the foot had burst. An Indian remedy was applied, but it was years before she recovered from the effects of that bite. In the meantime two children were born, each of whom turned spotted and sore, and then died.

A third born after her recovery was strong and healthy, and grew to manhood.

NOTE 5, page 73.

Oh, at the mill my brother lies Just at the point of death.

This was Mr. Charles Ingersoll, after whom Mrs. Secord named her only son. He had been wounded, and lay at St. David's Mill in a very precarious condition. He recovered, however, to fight again, and to become one of Woodstock's most prominent citizens.

NOTE 6, page 74.

The fritil' b.u.t.terfly.

This is the small fritillary, a beautiful little creature that may be seen flitting from blossom to blossom, or careering in the early summer air in the manner almost of a tumbler pigeon, before any other of its kind has left its winter's cradle. It is beautifully marked, of a golden brown, and the edges, of the wings are bordered with a narrow vandyking of pearly gray.

NOTE 7, page 74.

She hears the wolves' dread bands.

"Wolves were the pests of the country for many years, and even after they were partially expelled by the settlers, they used to make occasional descents upon the settlements, and many a farmer that counted his sheep by twenties at night would be thankful if he could muster half a score in the morning."-_See Ryerson's Loyalists_, p. 246.

NOTE 8, page 75.

Doomed St. David's Mill.

Auchinleck says, "From the 8th of July" [Chippewa was fought on the 4th]

"to the 23rd of the month, General Brown, with his enormous force, was content to remain without striking a blow, unless an occasional demonstration before Forts George and Mississaga, or the wanton conflagration of the village of St David's, be considered as such."

Of this atrocity an American officer, a Major McFarland, writes:--"The militia and Indians plundered and burnt every thing. The whole population is against us; not a foraging party but is fired on, and not infrequently returns with missing numbers. This state was to be antic.i.p.ated The militia have burnt several private dwelling-houses, and, on the 19th instant, burnt the village of St. David's, consisting of about thirty or forty houses. This was done within three miles of camp, and my battalion was sent to cover the retreat, as they [the militia] had been sent to scour the country, and it was presumed they might be pursued. My G.o.d, what a service! I never witnessed such a scene, and had not the commanding officer of the party, Lieutenant-Colonel Stone, been disgraced" [he was dismissed the service by sentence of a court-martial for this deed]

"and sent out of the army, I should have resigned my commission."

This disgust was not caused by any half-heartedness in the war on the part of Major McFarland, for he says in the same letter that "he desires no better fun than to fight the British troops."