Part 9 (1/2)
[Footnote 34: Mr. Nairne claimed as compensation for his _lods et ventes_ 4,560, 9s. 6d., (Halifax currency) and for the ba.n.a.l rights 3,400. He probably received considerably less. More than 400 dwellers in the seigniory still pay the annual _cens et rentes_.]
[Footnote 35: Malcolm Fraser's seigniory, Mount Murray, remained somewhat longer in the family of its original owner. On Fraser's death in 1815 his eldest son William, who had become a medical pract.i.tioner and a Roman Catholic, succeeded. He died without issue in 1830 and his brother, John Malcolm Fraser, then fell heir to the seigniory. When he died in 1860 the property pa.s.sed by will to his two daughters, both married to British officers. The elder, Mrs. Reeve, succeeded to the manor house. The younger, Mrs. Higham, soon sold her share to the Cimon family who became prominent in the district and one of whose members sat in Parliament at Ottawa on the Conservative side. Mrs. Reeve died in 1879 leaving the use of the property to her husband, Colonel Reeve, for his life. When he died in 1888, his son Mr. John Fraser Reeve, Malcolm Fraser's great-grandson, became seigneur. In 1902 he sold the property to the present seigneur, Mr. George T. Bonner, of New York, a Canadian by birth. Though there are numerous living descendants of Malcolm Fraser, Murray Bay knows them no more.]
[Footnote 36: Sacred to the memory of Lieutenant Colonel John Nairne, First Seigneur of Murray Bay. This Gallant Officer during 38 years distinguished himself as an able and brave Soldier. For simplicity of manners as a man, for Intrepidity and humanity as a Soldier, and for the virtues of a Gentleman, his memory will long be respected and cherished.
Born in Scotland, March 1, 1731. Died at Quebec, July 14, 1802.
Lieutenant Colonel Nairne first entered the Dutch Service where he belonged to that distinguished Corps, the Scotch Brigade. He afterwards entered the British Service where under Wolfe he was present at the taking of Louisbourg and Quebec. He also served under Murray and Carleton and distinguished himself in a most gallant manner when Quebec was attacked by the Americans in the years 1775 and 1776.
And of his eldest son, Lieutenant John Nairne of the 19th Regiment of Foot, who fell a victim to the climate of India when returning with the victorious troops from the capture of Seringapatam in the 21st year of his age; also of his youngest son, Captain Thomas Nairne, of the 49th Regiment of Foot who bravely fell at the head of his Company in the Battle at Chrysler's Farm in Upper Canada November 11, 1813, aged 26 years.
Also of John Leslie Nairne, great grandson of Colonel Nairne, born July 23, 1842, died March 18, 1845; and of John Nairne, Esq., Grandson of Colonel Nairne, born at Murray Bay, March 22nd, 1808, died at Quebec June 8, 1861; and of his Widow, Maria Katherine Leslie, died at Quebec, August 25, 1884, deeply regretted by her friends and by the poor of whom she was the constant benefactress.
This monument is erected in affectionate remembrance of much kindness by one who was privileged to enjoy their friends.h.i.+p during the best part of his life.]
CHAPTER VIII
THE COMING OF THE PLEASURE SEEKERS
Pleasure seeking at Murray Bay.--A fisherman's experience in 1830.--New visitors.--Fis.h.i.+ng in a mountain lake.--Camp life.--The Upper Murray.--Canoeing.--Running the rapids.--Walks and drives.--Golf.--A rainy day.--The habitant and his visitors.
In the Middle Ages mankind in pursuit of change of air and scene and of bodily and spiritual health went on pilgrimage to some famous shrine; in modern times dwellers in cities, in a similar pursuit, go in summer to some beautiful spot by sea, or lake, or mountain. To many these places then become as sacred as was the saint's shrine of an earlier age. Busy men have leisure there to be idle, to read, to enjoy companions.h.i.+p, to pursue wholesome pleasures. Such a spot has Murray Bay become to many.
Their intrusion was not looked upon with favour by those who wished to preserve the old simplicity, but it could not be resisted. More than a hundred years ago Colonel Nairne and Colonel Fraser had parties of guests in the summer that must have made the two manor houses lively enough. The beauty of the place, its coolness when Quebec and Montreal suffered from sweltering heat in the short Canadian summer, the simplicity and charm of its life, proved alluring. There was also excellent sport. Salmon and trout abounded. Though time has brought changes, in some seasons the salmon fis.h.i.+ng is still excellent and, in all the world, probably, there is no better trout fis.h.i.+ng than in the upper waters of the Murray and in some of the lakes.
Thus it happened that the earliest annals of pleasure seeking at Murray Bay relate to fis.h.i.+ng. It is at least possible that more than two hundred years ago the Sieur de Comporte tried his fortune as a fisherman in the lake that bears his name. A hundred and fifty years ago, as we have seen, Captain Nairne and his guest Gilchrist had such excellent salmon fis.h.i.+ng that Gilchrist thought this sport alone worth a trip across the Atlantic. Many other fis.h.i.+ng expeditions to Malbaie there must have been and, fortunately, a detailed narrative of one of them, made in 1830, has been preserved. The fishermen were Major Wingfield and Dr. Henry--attached to the 66th regiment at Montreal.
They went by steamer from Montreal to Quebec and an American General on board jeered at them for travelling three hundred miles to catch fish which they could buy in the market at their door! When they reached Quebec they found no steamer for Murray Bay,--hardly strange as then the steamboat was comparatively new. Three days they waited at Quebec until at length they bargained with the captain of a coasting schooner bound for Kamouraska, on the south sh.o.r.e of the St. Lawrence, to land them at Malbaie. The weather was stormy, the s.h.i.+p nearly foundered, and the eighty miles of the journey occupied no less than four days and nights.
The fishermen had brought with them a quarter of cold lamb, a loaf, and a bottle of wine, but, before the journey was over, sheer hunger drove them to the s.h.i.+p's salt pork and to sausages stuffed with garlic. Rather than take refuge below among ”thirty or forty dirty habitants from Kamouraska” they stuck to the deck and encamped under the great sail, but the rain fell so heavily that they could not even keep their cigars alight. At length ”with beards like Jews,” cold, wet, half-starved and miserable, they reached their destination. As they landed at Murray Bay they saw a salmon floundering in a net, bought it, and carried it with them to the house of a man named Chaperon where they had engaged lodgings. Here, says Dr. Henry, the sensation of being clean and comfortable in their host's ”pleasant parlour” was delicious. The tea, the toast, the dainty prints of fresh b.u.t.ter were all exquisite ”after rancid pork and garlic,” and he declares that they ate for two hours and consumed ”some half gallon of thick cream and half a bushel of new laid eggs.” Under their window bloomed a rose bush in full flower. Murray Bay was at its best.
On Monday morning, July 5th, 1830, the two fishermen engaged a _caleche_, and a boy named Louis Panet drove them up the Murray River.
The present village church was already standing, ”a respectable church,”
says Dr. Henry, ”with its long roof and glittering spire and a tall elm or two”; the elms, alas, have disappeared and now there are only willows. A wooden bridge crossed the Murray and its large abutments loaded with great boulders told of formidable spring floods sweeping down the valley. A recent ”eboulement” or land slide had blocked the road along the river and men were still busy clearing away the rubbish.
Eight or ten miles up the river at the fall known as the Chute, still a favourite spot for salmon fis.h.i.+ng, they had magnificent sport. One Jean Gros, in a crazy canoe, took them to the best places for casting the fly. The first salmon weighed twenty-five pounds and they had to play it for three-quarters of an hour. That evening when they returned to M.
Chaperon's, to feast once more, they had five salmon weighing in all one hundred and five pounds and forty-five sea trout averaging three pounds each. No wonder Gilchrist has said such fis.h.i.+ng was worth a trip across the Atlantic! The blot on the day's enjoyment was that in the July weather they were pestered with flies.
Excellent sport continued from day to day. Once Jean Gros lost his hold of the pole by which he controlled the canoe and it drifted helplessly towards a rapid, Henry all the time playing a salmon. The man was alarmed and knelt to mumble prayers but Henry caught up a board thrown from the sh.o.r.e, gave him a whack with it on the back and shouted: ”_Ramez! Sacre! Ramez!_” The effect was electrical. The old fellow seized the board, paddled with it like mad, steered down the rapid, and Henry finally landed his salmon. Day after day the two fishermen drove up to the Chute to fish until, after a fortnight, the river fell and the salmon ceased to rise; then they went down in a large boat to Riviere Noire, said never yet to have been fished with a rod, slept at night on the sandy beach, but had no luck. Henry tells of an annoyance at Malbaie that still continues; mongrel dogs ran after their _caleche_; sometimes one would try to seize the horse by the nose and nearly cause a run-away. Each cur pursued the vehicle and barked himself hoa.r.s.e, and then, when he retired, his neighbour would take up the task. At length, after this experience had been frequently renewed, they decided to retaliate. One black s.h.a.ggy beast had made himself specially obnoxious; with his thick wooly fur he did not mind in the least being struck by the whip. So one day Dr. Henry got ready the salmon gaff and, as the brute darted out at them, skilfully hooked him by the side. The driver whipped up his horse, which seemed to enjoy the punishment of his enemy, and the vehicle went tearing along the road, the dog yelling hideously as he was dragged by the hook. The people ran to the doors holding up their hands in astonishment. The Doctor soon shook off the dog and he trotted home little the worse. Next day when he saw the fisherman's caleche coming he limped into the house ”as mute as a fish”
with his tail between his legs.
Dr. Henry thought Murray Bay an earthly paradise. The people in this ”secluded valley” were the most virtuous he had ever seen. Flagrant crime was unknown,--doors were never locked at night. There was no need of temperance reform; ”whole families pa.s.s their lives without any individual ever having tasted intoxicating fluids.” The devout people, he says, had social family wors.h.i.+p, morning and evening; the families were huge, fifteen to twenty children being not uncommon; when a young couple married the relations united to build a house for them; and so on. Unfortunately we know from other sources that conditions were not as idyllic at Murray Bay as Dr. Henry describes; but it was, no doubt, a simple and virtuous community.
In time its isolation was to disappear before invaders like Dr. Henry, in pursuit of pleasure. So gradual was the change that we hardly know when it came. By 1850 there was a little summer colony mostly from Quebec and Montreal. Soon a few came from points more distant. As means of transport on the St. Lawrence improved a great many travellers pa.s.sed Murray Bay on their way to the Saguenay. Tadousac, at its mouth, was already well known and an occasional stray visitor stopped off at Murray Bay to see what it was like. The accommodation offered was rude enough, no doubt, but perhaps less rude than one might suppose. At Pointe au Pic stood a substantial stone house. This was turned into a hotel and known some fifty years ago as Duberger's house. There were besides a few other houses for summer visitors. Thus, long ago, was there tolerable comfort at Murray Bay. In any case visitors soon found that the place had abundant compensations even for discomfort. They came and came again.
Friends came to visit them and they too learned to love the spot. Some Americans from New York chanced to find it out and others of their countrymen followed; by 1885 already well established was the now dominant American colony.
The influx has limited and restricted but has not destroyed the old diversion of fis.h.i.+ng. There are still many hundreds of lakes in the neighbourhood on which no fisherman has ever yet cast a fly. But nearly all the good spots within easy range are now leased or owned by private persons and clubs; no longer may the transient tourist fish almost where he pleases. All the better for this restriction is the quality of the fis.h.i.+ng. What magnificent sport there is in some of those tiny lakes on the mountain side and what glorious views as one drives thither! To reach Lac a Comporte, for instance, one crosses the brawling Murray, drives up its left bank for a mile or so and then heads straight up the mountain side. Turning back one can see the silver gleam of the small river winding through its narrow valley until lost in the enveloping mountains. From points still higher one looks northwestward upon the mountain crests worn round ages ago, some of them probably never yet trodden by the foot of man. Most are wooded to the top but there are bare crags, a glowing purple sometimes in the afternoon light; but the prevailing tone is the deep, deep blue, the richest surely that nature can show anywhere. Along the road where we are driving stretch the houses of the habitants and sometimes, to survey the pa.s.sing strangers, the whole family stands on the rude door-step. They rarely fail in a courteous greeting, with a touch still of the manners of France.
Two or three days spent on one of these wild mountain lakes, such as Lac a Comporte, is as pleasant an experience as any one can have. The walk is beautiful from the last cottage where the vehicles are left and the two or three men are secured who shoulder the packs with the necessary provisions. At first the forest path is hewn broadly in a straight line but it soon narrows to a trail winding up the mountain side. The way is rough; one must clamber over occasional boulders and turn aside to avoid fallen trees. The white stems of birches are conspicuous in the forest thicket. After a stiff climb we have pa.s.sed over the shoulder of the mountain; the path is now trending downward and at length through the arch of green over the pathway one catches the gleam of the lake. The pace quickens and in a few minutes we stand upon the sh.o.r.e of a lovely little sheet of water with a sh.o.r.e line perhaps three miles long, lying in the mountain hollow. Evening is near and, half an hour later, each fisherman is in a boat paddled softly by a habitant companion. In a thousand places the calm water is disturbed by the trout feeding busily; they often throw themselves quite clear of the water and, when the sport has well begun, at a single cast one occasionally takes a trout on each of his three flies. Before it is dark the whole circuit of the lake has been made and a goodly basket of trout is the result.
A camp at evening is always delightful. The tired fishermen lie by the cheery fire while the men prepare the evening meal, to consist chiefly of the trout just caught. They have the vivacity and readiness of their race: rough habitants though they are their courtesy is inborn, inalienable. After the meal is over silence often falls on the group of three or four by the fire. Every one is tired and at barely nine o'clock it is time for bed. Before each of the two or three small tents standing some distance apart by the water's edge the men have built a blazing fire which throws its light far out over the tiny lake. All round rise the mountains, now dark and sombre; a sharp wind is blowing and as one stands alone looking out over the water there comes a sense of chill; for a moment the mountain solitude seems remote, melancholy and friendless: with something like a s.h.i.+ver one turns to the cheerful fire before the tent. Here blankets are spread on sweet scented boughs of _sapin_; the bed is hard, but not too hard for a tired man and one quickly falls asleep.