Picturesque Quebec : a sequel to Quebec past and present Part 35

The chief charm of Beauvoir is in its beautiful level lawn and deep overhanging woods, recalling vividly to mind the many beautiful homes of merry England. Mr. Dobell the proprietor is largely engaged in mercantile operations, and for many years past has carried on the most extensive business in the lumber trade.

In 1865 we alluded as follows to this bright Canadian Home, which the shadow of death was soon to darken:

"Crowning a sloping lawn, intersected by a small stream, and facing the Etchemin Mills, you notice on the south side of the St. Lewis road, next to Clermont, a neat dwelling hid amongst huge pines and other forest trees; that is one of our oldest English country seats. Family memories of three generations consecrate the spot. Would you like a glimpse of domestic life as enjoyed at Sillery? then follow that bevy of noisy, rosy- cheeked boys in Lennoxville caps, with gun and rod in hand, hurrying down those steep, narrow steps leading from the bank to the Cove below. How they scamper along, eager to walk the deck of that trim little craft, the _Falcon_, anch.o.r.ed in the stream, and sitting like a bird on the bosom of the famed river. Wait a minute and you will see the mainsail flutter in the breeze. Now our rollicking young friends have marched past ruins of "chapel, convent, hospital," &c., on the beach; you surely did not expect them to look glum and melancholy. Of course they knew all about "Monsieur Puiseaux," "le Chevalier de Sillery," "the house where dwelt Emily Montague"; but do not, if you have any respect for that thrice happy age, the halcyon days of jackets and frills, befog their brains with the musty records of departed years. Let the lads enjoy their summer vacation, radiant, happy, heedless of the future. Alas! it may yet overtake them soon enough! What care could contract their brow? Have they not fed for the day their rabbits, their pigeons, their guinea-pigs? Is not that faithful Newfoundland dog "Boatswain," who saved from drowning one of their school-mates, is he not as usual their companion on s.h.i.+p-board or ash.o.r.e? There, now, they drop down the stream for a long day's cruise round the Island of Orleans. Next week, peradventure, you may hear of the _Falcon_ and its jolly crew having sailed for Portneuf, Murray Bay, the Saguenay or Bersimis, to throw a cast for salmon, sea-trout or mackerel, in some sequestered pool or sheltered bay.

"There we'll drop our lines, and gather Old Ocean's treasures in."

Are they not glorious, handsome, manly fellows, our Sillery boys? No wonder we are all proud of them, of the twins as much as the rest, and more so perhaps. "Our Parish" you must know, is renowned for the proportion in which it contributes to the census: twins--a common occurrence; occasionally, triplets.

Such we knew this Canadian home in the days of the late Henry Lemesurier.

_MONTAGUE COTTAGE._

"I knew by the smoke which so gracefully curled, Above the green wood that a cottage was near."

--_Moore's Woodp.e.c.k.e.r._

Facing Sillery hill, on the north side of "Sans Bruit," formerly the estate of Lieut.-Col. the Hon. Henry Caldwell, Mr. Alfred P. Wheeler, [245] the Tide Surveyor of H. M. Customs, Quebec, built in 1880, a comfortable and pleasing little cottage. He has called it Montague Cottage [246] in memory of Wolfe's brave a.s.sistant Quarter Master General Col.

Caldwell, of Sans Bruit, the Col. Rivers of "The Novel and the preferred suitor of Emily Montague who addressed her romantic 'Sillery letters to Col. Rivers from a house not far from the Hill of Sillery.

It is stated in all the old Quebec Guide Books that the house in which the 'divine Emily then dwelt stood on the foot of Sillery Hill, close to Mrs.

Graddon's property at Kilmarnock, her friend Bella Fermor probably lived near her. Vol. I of the Work, page 61, states; "I am at present at an extremely pretty farm on the banks of the River St. Lawrence, the house stands as the foot of a steep mountain covered with a variety of trees forming a verdant sloping wall, which rises in a kind of regular confusion, shade above shade a woody theatre, and has in front this n.o.ble river, on which s.h.i.+ps continually pa.s.sing present to the delighted eye the most charming picture imaginable. I never saw a place so formed to inspire that pleasing la.s.situde, that divine inclination to saunter, which may not improperly be called the luxurious indolence of the country. I intend to build a temple here to the charming G.o.ddess of laziness. A gentleman is coming down the winding path on the side of the hill, whom by his air I take to be your brother. Adieu. I must receive him, my father is in Quebec. Yours,

ARABELLA FERMOR.

_THE HISTORY OF EMILY MONTAGUE._

On the 22nd March 1769, a novelist of some standing Mrs. Frances Brooks an officer's lady, [247] author of _Lady Julia Mandeville_ published in London a work in four volumes, which she dedicated to His Excellency the Governor of Canada, Guy Carleton afterwards Lord Dorchester, under the t.i.tle of the _History of Emily Montague_ being a series of letters addressed from Sillery by Emily Montague the heroine of the tale, to her lively and witty friend Bella Fermor--to some military admirers in Quebec, Montreal, and New York--to some British n.o.blemen, friends of her father.

This novel, whether it was through the writer's _entourage_ in the world or her _entree_ to fas.h.i.+onable circles, or whether on account of its own intrinsic literary worth, had an immense success in its day. The racy description it contains of Canadian scenery, and colonial life, mixed with the fas.h.i.+onable gossip of our Belgravians of 1766, seven years after the conquest, caused several English families to emigrate to Canada. Some settled in the neighborhood of Quebec, at Sillery, it is said. Whether they found all things _couleur-de- rose_, as the clever Mrs. Brooke had described them,--whether they enjoyed as much Arcadian bliss as the Letters of _Emily Montague_ had promised--it would be very ungallant for us to gainsay, seeing that Mrs. Brooke is not present to vindicate herself. As to the literary merit of the novel, this much we will venture to a.s.sert, that setting aside the charm of a.s.sociation, we doubt that _Emily Montague_ if republished at present, would make the fortune of her publisher. Novel writing, like other things, has considerably changed since 1766, and however much the florid Richardson style may have pleased the great grandfathers of the present generation, it would scarcely chime in with the taste of readers in our sensational times.

In Mrs. Brooke's day Quebecers appear to have amused themselves pretty much as they do now, a century later. In the summer, riding, driving boating, pic-nics at Lake St. Charles, the Falls of Montmorenci, &c.

In winter tandems, sleigh drives, toboganing at the ice cone, tomycod fis.h.i.+ng on the St. Charles, Chateau b.a.l.l.s; the formation of a _pont_ or ice-bridge and its breaking up in the spring--two events of paramount importance. The military, later on, the promoters of conviviality, sport and social amus.e.m.e.nts; in return obtaining the _entree_ to the houses of the chief citizens; toying with every English rosebud or Gallic-lily, which might strew their path in spite of paternal and maternal admonitions from the other side of the Atlantic; occasionally leading to the hymeneal altar a Canadian bride, and next introducing her to their horror-stricken London relatives, astounded to find out that our Canadian belles, were neither the colour of copper, nor of ebony; in education and accomplishments, their equals--sometimes their superiors when cla.s.s is compared to cla.s.s. Would you like a few extracts from this curious old Sillery novel? Bella Fermor, one of Emily Montague's familiars, and a most ingrained _coquette_, thus writes from Sillery in favour of a military protege on the 16th September, 1766, to the "divine" Emily, who had just been packed oft to Montreal to recover from a love fit.

"Sir George is handsome as an Adonis ... you allow him to be of an amiable character; he is rich, young, well-born, and he loves you..."

All in vain thus to plead Sir. George's cause, a das.h.i.+ng Col. Rivers (meant, we were told, by the Hon. W. Sheppard, to personify Col. Henry Caldwell, of Belmont) had won the heart of Emily, who preferred true love to a coronet. Let us treasure up a few more sentences fallen from Emily's light-hearted confidante. A postscript to a letter runs thus-- "Adieu, Emily, I am going to ramble in the woods and pick berries with a little smiling civil captain [we can just fancy we see some of our fair acquaintances' mouths water at such a prospect], who is enamoured of me. A pretty rural amus.e.m.e.nt for lovers." Decidedly; all this in the romantic woodlands of Sillery, a sad place it must be confessed, when even boarding school misses, were they to ramble thus, could scarcely escape contracting the _scarlet_ fever. Here goes another extract:--

(BELLA FERMOR TO MISS RIVERS. LONDON)

"Sillery, Sept. 20th, (1766)--10 o'clock.

"Ah! we are vastly to be pitied; no beaux at all at the general's, only about six to one; a pretty proportion, and what I hope always to see. We--the ladies I mean--drink chocolate with the general to- morrow, and he gives us a ball on Thursday; you would not know Quebec again. Nothing but smiling faces now: all gay as never was--the sweetest country in the world. Never expect to see me in England again; one is really somebody here. I have been asked to dance by only twenty-seven. ..."

Ah! who would not forgive the frolicsome Bella all her flirtations?

But before we dismiss this pleasant record of other days, yet another extract, and we have done.

(BELLA FERMOR TO LUCY RIVERS)

"Sillery--Eight in the evening.

"Absolutely, Lucy, I will marry a savage and turn squaw (a pretty soft name for an Indian Princess!) Never was anything so delightful as their lives. They talk of French husbands, but commend me to an Indian one, who lets his wife ramble five hundred miles without asking where she is going.

"I was sitting after dinner, with a book, in a thicket of hawthorn near the beach, when a loud laugh called my attention to the river, when I saw a canoe of savages making to the sh.o.r.e. There were six women and two or three children, without one man amongst them. They landed and tied the canoe to the root of a tree, and finding out the most agreeable shady spot amongst the bushes with which the beach was covered, (which happened to be very near me) made a fire, on which they laid some fish to broil, and fetching water from the river, sat down on the gra.s.s to their frugal repast. I stole softly to the house, and ordering a servant to bring some wine and cold provisions, returned to my squaws. I asked them in French if they were of Lorette, they shook their heads--I repeated the question in English, when the eldest of the women told me they were not, that their country was on the borders of New England, that their husbands being on a hunting party in the woods, curiosity and the desire to see their brethren, the English, who had conquered Quebec, had brought them up the great river, down which they should return as soon as they had seen Montreal. She courteously asked me to sit down and eat with them, which I complied with and produced my part of the feast. We soon became good company, and brightened the chain of friends.h.i.+p with two bottles of wine, which put them in such spirits that they danced, sung, shook me by the hand, and grew so fond of me that I began to be afraid I should not easily get rid of them.

"Adieu! my father is just come in and has brought some company with him from Quebec to supper.

"Yours ever,

"A. FERMOR."

KIRK ELLA

"This villa, erected in 1850 on the north side of the St. Lewis road, facing Cataracoui, affords a striking exemplification of how soon taste and capital can transform a wilderness into a habitation combining every appliance of modern refinement and rustic adornment. It covers about eighty-two acres, two thirds of which are green meadows, wheat fields, &c., the remainder, plantations, gardens and lawn. The cottage itself is a plain, unpretending structure, made more roomy by the recent addition of a dining room, &c., in rear. On emerging from the leafy avenue, the visitor notices two _parterres_ of wild flowers--kalmias, trilliums, etc.,-- transplanted from the neighboring wood, with the rank, moist soil of the Gomin marsh to derive nourishment from, they appear to thrive. In rear of these _parterres_ a granite rockery, festooned with ferns, wild violets, &c., raises its green gritty, rugged outline. This pretty European embellishment we would much like to see more generally introduced in our Canadian landscape; it is strikingly picturesque. The next object which catches the eye is the conservatory in which are displayed the most extensive collection of exotics in Sillery. In the centre of some fifty large camellia shrubs there is a magnificent specimen of the fimbriata variety--white leaves with a fringed border; it stands twelve feet high with corresponding breadth. When it is loaded with blossoms in the winter the spectacle is exquisitely beautiful. In the rear of the conservatory are a vinery, a peach and apricot house; like the conservatory, all span- roofed and divided off in several compartments, heated by steam-pipes and furnaces, with stop-c.o.c.ks to r.e.t.a.r.d or accelerate vegetation at will. On the 31st May, when we visited the establishment, we found the black Hamburg grapes the size of cherries; the peaches and apricots correspondingly advanced; the cherries under gla.s.s quite over. One of the latest improvements is a second flower garden to the west of the house, in the English landscape style. In rear of this garden to the north, there existed formerly a cedar swamp, which deep subsoil draining with tiles has converted into a gra.s.s meadow of great beauty; a belt of pine, spruce, tamarack, and some deciduous trees, thinned towards the south-west, let in a glimpse of the St. Lawrence and the high-wooded Point Levi sh.o.r.es, shutting out the view of the St. Lewis road, and completely overshadowing the porter's lodge; out-houses, stables, root-house, paddocks and barns are all on a correspondingly extensive scale. We have here another instance of the love of country life which our successful Canadian merchant likes to indulge in; and we can fancy, judging from our own case, with what zest Mr. Burstall the portly laird of Kirk Ella, after a toilsome day in his St. Peter street counting-house, hurried home to revel in the rustic beauty which surrounds his dwelling." Such was Kirk Ella in 1865.

Mr. Burstall having withdrawn from business, removed to England and died there a few years back. Kirk Ella has now become the property of Charles Ernest Levey, Esq., only son of the late Charles E. Levey, Esq., formerly of Cataracoui. The dwelling having been destroyed by fire in 1879, the new owner decided on erecting a handsome roomy mansion on the same site. The visitor at Kirk Ella, after paying his devoirs to the youthful Chatelain and Chatelaine, can admire at leisure Mr. Levey's numerous and expensive stud: "Lollypop", "Bismark," "Joker," "Jovial," "Tichborne," "Burgundy,"

"Catch-him-alivo," a crowd of fleet steeds, racing and trotting stock, surrounded by a yelping and frisky pack of "Peppers," "Mustards,"

"Carlos," "Guys," "Josephines," "Fidlers;" Mastiffs, French Poodles, Fox Terriers, Bulldogs,--Kirk Ella is a perfect Elysium for that faithful though noisy friend of man, the dog.

_CATARACOUI._

The conflagration of Spencer Wood, on the 12th March, 1860, made it inc.u.mbent on the Provincial Government to provide for His Excellency Sir Edmund Head a suitable residence. After examining several places, Cataracoui, the residence of Henry Burstall, Esquire, opposite to Kirk Ella was selected, and additions made, and still greater decorations and improvements ordered when it became known that the First Gentleman in England, our Sovereign's eldest son, was soon to pay a flying visit to Her Majesty's Canadian lieges. Cataracoui can boast of having harbored two princes of the blood royal, the prince of Wales, and his brother Alfred; a circ.u.mstance which no doubt much enhanced its prestige in the eyes of its owner. It was laid out about 1836 by Jas. B. Forsyth, Esq., the first proprietor, and reflects credit on his taste.

This seat, without possessing the extensive grounds, vast river frontage, and long shady walks of Spencer Wood, or Woodfield, is an eminently picturesque residence. A new grapery with a lean-to roof, about ninety feet in length, has just been completed: the choicest [248] varieties of the grape vine are here cultivated. Several tasty additions have, also, recently been made to the conservatory, under the superintendence of a Scotch landscape gardener, Mr. P. Lowe, formerly in charge of the Spencer Wood conservatories, &c. We had the pleasure on one occasion to view, on a piercing winter day, from the drawing room of Cataracoui, through the gla.s.s door which opens on the conservatory, the rare collections of exotics it contains,--a perfect grove of verdure and blossoms,--the whole lit up by the mellow light of the setting sun, whose rays scintillated in every fantastic form amongst this gorgeous tropical vegetation, whilst the snow-wreathed evergreens, surrounding the conservatory waved their palms to the orb of day in our clear, bracing Canadian atmosphere--summer and winter combined in one landscape; the tropics and their luxuriant magnolias, divided by an inch of gla.s.s from the realms of old king frost and his hardy familiars, the pine and the maple. Charming was the contrast, furnis.h.i.+ng a fresh proof of the comfort and luxury with which the European merchant, once settled in Canada, surrounds his home. What, indeed, can be more gratifying, during the arctic, though healthy, temperature of our winter, than to step from a cosy drawing-room, with its cheerful grate-fire, into a green, floral bower, and inhale the aroma of the orange and the rose, whilst the eye is charmed by the blossoming camellia of virgin whiteness; the wisteria, spirea, azalea, rhododendron, and odorous daphne, all blending their perfume or exquisite tints.

Cataracoui has been recently decorated, we may say, with regal magnificence, and Sillery is justly proud of this fairy abode, for years the country seat of the late Charles B. Levey, Esq., and still occupied by Mrs. Levey and family.

_ROSEWOOD._

"Along their blus.h.i.+ng borders, bright with dew, And in yon mingled wilderness of flowers, Fair-handed Spring unbosoms every grace; Throws out the snow-drop and the crocus first; The daisy, primrose, violet darkly blue, And polyanthus of unnumber'd dyes; The yellow wall-flower, stain'd with iron-brown; And lavish stock that scents the garden round; From the soft wing of vernal breezes shed, Anemones; auriculas, enrich'd With s.h.i.+ning meal o'er all their velvet leaves; And full ranunculas, of glowing red.

Then comes the tulip race, where beauty plays Her idle freaks; from family diffus'd To family, as flies the father dust, The varied colors run; and while they break On the charm'd eye th' exulting florist marks, With sweet pride, the wonders of his hand.

No gradual bloom is wanting; from the bud, First-born of spring, to summer's musky tribes Nor hyacinths, of purest virgin white, Low bent, and blus.h.i.+ng inward; nor jonquils Of potent fragrance; nor narcissus fair, As o'er the fabled fountain hanging still; Nor broad carnations, nor gay spotted pink; Nor, shower'd from every bush, the damask rose."

A tiny and unostentatious cottage buried among the trees. All around it, first, flowers; secondly, flowers; thirdly, flowers. The garden, a network of walks, and spruce hedges of rare beauty; occasionally you stumble unexpectedly on a rustic bower, tenanted by an Apollo or Greek slave in marble, or else you find yourself on turning an angle on the shady bank of a sequestered pond, in which lively trout disport themselves as merrily as those goldfish you just noticed in the aquarium in the hall hung round with Krieghoff's exquisite "Canadian scenery." You can also, as you pa.s.s along, catch the loud notes issuing from the house aviary and blending with the soft, wild melody of the wood warblers and robin; but the prominent feature of the place are flowers, sweet flowers, to charm the eye and perfume the air. Do not wonder at that; this was the summer abode of a gentleman whose name usually stood high on the Montreal and Quebec exhibition prize list, and who was as successful in his commercial ventures as he had been in the culture of carnations, zenias, gladiolus, roses and dahlias. We remember seeing six hundred dahlias in bloom at Rosewood at the same time, the _coup d'oeil_ and contrasts between the varieties were striking in the extreme.

This rustic cottage was the summer residence of the late Jas. Gibb, Esq., of the old firm of Lane, Gibb & Co., a name remembered with grat.i.tude, in several educational and charitable inst.i.tutions of Quebec for the munificent bequests of its owner.

_RAVENSWOOD._

Near some fair town I'd have a private seat, Built uniform, nor little, nor too great; Better if on a rising ground it stood,-- On this side fields, on that a neighboring wood; A little garden, grateful to the eye, Where a cool rivulet runs murmuring by."

In the year 1848, Mr. Samuel Wright, of Quebec, purchased from John Porter, Esq., that upper portion of Meadowbank (the old estate of Lieutenant Governor Cramahe in 1762), which lies to the north of the Cap Rouge or St. Lewis road, and built a dwelling thereon. In 1846 Mr.

Wright's property was put in the market, and Ravenswood acquired by the present owner, William Herring, Esq., of the late firm of Charles E. Levey & Co. No sylvan spot could have been procured, had all the woods around Quebec been ransacked, of wilder beauty. In the centre, a pretty cottage; to the east, trees; to the west, trees; to the north and south, trees-- stately trees all around you. Within a few rods from the hall door a limpid little brook oozes from under an old plantation, and forms, under a thorn tree of extraordinary size and most fantastically shaped limbs, a reservoir of clear water, round which, from a rustic seat, you notice speckled trout roaming fearlessly. Here was, for a man familiar with the park-like scenery of England, a store of materials to work into shape.

That dense forest must be thinned; that indispensable adjunct of every Sillery home a velvety lawn, must be had; a peep through the trees, on the surrounding country, obtained; the stream dammed up so as to produce a sheet of water, on which a birch canoe will be launched; more air let in round the house; more of the forest cut away; and some fine beech, birch, maple, and pine trees grouped. The lawn would look better with a graceful and leafy elm in the centre, and a few smaller ones added to the perspective. By dint of care, elms of a goodly size were removed from the mountain brow. The efforts of the proprietor to plant large trees at Ravenswood have been eminently successful, and ought to stimulate others to add such valuable, such permanent elements of beauty, to their country seats. One plantation, by its luxuriance, pleased us more than any other, that which shades both sides of the avenue. Few of our places can boast of possessing a more beautifully-wooded and gracefully-curved approach to the house than Ravenswood. You see nothing of the dwelling until you emerge from this neat plantation of evergreens. We once viewed it under its most fascinating aspect; 'tis pretty in the bright, effulgent radiance of day, but when the queen of night sends forth her soft rays, and allows them to slumber silently on the rustling boughs of the green pines and firs, with the dark, gravelled avenue, visible here and there at every curve, no sounds heard except the distant murmur of the _Chaudiere_ river, the effect is striking.

_THE WOODS OF SILLERY._