Part 23 (1/2)
Mr. Weekes, we believe, was an unmarried man. He was fond of solitary rambles in the woods in search of game. Once he was so long missing that foul play was suspected; and some human remains having been found under a heap of logs on the property of Peter Ernest, Peter Ernest was arrested; and just as the evidence was all going strongly against him, Mr. Weekes appeared on the scene alive and well.
One more of these inhuman and unchristian encounters, with fatal result, memorable in the early annals of York, we shall have occasion to speak of hereafter when, in our intended progress up Yonge Street, we pa.s.s the spot where the tragedy was enacted.
Mr. Weekes was greatly regretted by his const.i.tuents. ”Overwhelmed with grief,” they say in their address dated the 20th September, 1806, to the gentleman whom they desire to succeed him, ”at the unexpected death of our late able and upright Representative; we, freeholders of these Counties of York, Durham and Simcoe, feel that we have neglected our interests in the season of sorrow. Now awake, it is to you we turn; notwithstanding the great portion of consolation which we draw from the dawning of our impartial and energetic administration. (The allusion is to Gov. Gore.)
”Fully persuaded that the great object of your heart is the advancement of public prosperity, the observance of the laws, and the practice of religion and morality, we hasten with a.s.surances of our warmest support, to invite you from your retreat to represent us in Parliament. Permit us, however, to impress upon you, that as subjects of a generous and beloved King; as a part of that great nation which has for so long a time stood the bulwark of Europe, and is now the solitary and inaccessible asylum of liberty; as the children of Englishmen, guarded, protected and restrained by English laws; in fine, as members of their community, as fathers and sons, we are induced to place this confidence in your virtue, from the firm hope that, equally insensible to the impulse of popular feeling and the impulse of power, you will pursue what is right. This has been the body of your decisions; may it be the spirit of your counsels! (Signed by fifty-two persons, residing in the Town and Towns.h.i.+p of York.)” The names not given.
These words were addressed to Mr. Justice Thorpe. His reply was couched in the following terms: ”Gentlemen: With pleasure I accede to your desire. If you make me your representative I will faithfully discharge my duty. Your confidence is not misplaced. May the first moment of dereliction be the last of my existence. Your late worthy representative I lament from my heart. In private he was a warm friend; at the Bar an able advocate, and in Parliament a firm patriot. It is but just to draw consolation from our Governor, when the first act of his administration granted to those in the U. E. list and their children, what your late most valuable member so strenuously laboured to obtain. Surely from this we have every reason to expect that the liberal interests of our beloved sovereign, whose chief glory is to reign triumphantly enthroned on the hearts of a free people, will be fulfilled, honouring those who give and those who receive, enriching the Province and strengthening the Empire.
Let us cherish this hope in the blossom; may it not be blasted in the ripening.” A postscript is subjoined: ”P. S. If influence, threat, coercion or oppression should be attempted to be exercised over any individual, for the purpose of controlling the freedom of election, let me be informed.--R. T.”
In 1806 Judges were not ineligible to the Upper Canadian Parliament. Mr.
Justice Thorpe and Governor Gore did not agree. He was consequently removed from office. Some years later, when both gentlemen were living in England as private persons, Mr. Thorpe brought an action for libel against Mr. Gore, and obtained a favourable verdict.
We now proceed on our prescribed course. So late as 1833, Walton, in his ”York Commercial Directory, Street Guide, and Register,” when naming the residents on Lot Street, as he still designates Queen Street, makes a note on arriving at two park lots to the westward of the spot where we have been pausing, to the effect, that ”here this street is intercepted by the grounds of Capt. McGill, S. P. Jarvis, Esq., and Hon. W. Allan; past here it is open to the Roman Catholic Church, and intended to be carried through to the Don Bridge.”
The process of levelling up, now become so common in Toronto, has effectually disposed of the difficulty temporarily presented by the ravine or ancient water-course, yet partially to be seen either in front of or upon the park lots occupied by the old inhabitants just named; and Queen Street, at the present hour, is an uninterrupted thoroughfare in a right line, and almost on a level the whole way, from the Don in the east to the Lunatic Asylum in the west, and beyond, on to the gracefully curving margin of Humber Bay.--(The unfrequented and rather tortuous Britain Street is a relic of the deviation occasioned by the ravine, although the actual route followed in making the detour of old was d.u.c.h.ess Street.)
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XIX.
QUEEN STREET--DIGRESSION AT CAROLINE STREET--HISTORY OF THE EARLY PRESS.
A little to the south of Britain Street, between it and d.u.c.h.ess Street, near the spot where Caroline Street, slightly diverging from the right line, pa.s.ses northward to Queen Street, there stood in the early day a long, low wooden structure, memorable to ourselves, as being, in our school-boy days, the Government Printing Office. Here the _Upper Canada Gazette_ was issued, by ”R. C. Horne, Printer to the King's Most Excellent Majesty.”
We shall have occasion hereafter to notice among our early inhabitants some curious instances of change of profession. In the present case, His Majesty's Printer was in reality an Army Surgeon, once attached to the Glengary Light Infantry. And again, afterwards, the same gentleman was for many years the Chief Teller in the Bank of Upper Canada. An incident in the troubles of 1837 was ”the burning of Dr. Horne's house,” by a party of the malcontents who were making a show of a.s.sault upon the town. The site of this building, a conspicuous square two-storey frame family residence, was close to the toll-bar on Yonge Street, in what is now Yorkville. On that occasion, we are informed, Dr. Horne ”berated the Lieutenant-Governor for treating with avowed rebels, and insisted that they were not in sufficient force to give any ground of alarm.”
The _Upper Canada Gazette_ was the first newspaper published in Upper Canada. Its first number appeared at Newark or Niagara, on Thursday, the 18th of April, 1793. As it was apparently expected to combine with a record of the acts of the new government some account of events happening on the continent at large, it was made to bear the double t.i.tle of _Upper Canada Gazette, or American Oracle_. Louis Roy was its first printer, a skilled artizan engaged probably from Lower Canada, where printing had been introduced about thirty years previously, soon after the English occupation of the country.
Louis Roy's name appears on the face of No. 1, Vol. I. The type is of the shape used in contemporaneous printing, and the execution is very good. The size of the sheet, which retained the folio form, was 15 by 9 inches. The quality of the paper was rather coa.r.s.e, but stout and durable.
The address to the public in the first number is as follows:--”The Editor of this paper respectfully informs the public that the flattering prospect which he has of an extensive sale for his new undertaking has enabled him to augment the size originally proposed from a Demy Quarto to a Folio.
”The encouragement he has met will call forth every exertion he is master of, so as to render the paper useful, entertaining and instructive. He will be very happy in being favoured with such communications as may contribute to the information of the public, from those who shall be disposed to a.s.sist him, and in particular shall be highly flattered in becoming the vehicle of intelligence in this growing Province of whatever may tend to its internal benefit and common advantage. In order to preserve the veracity of his paper, which will be the first object of his attention, it will be requisite that all transactions of a domestic nature, such as deaths, marriages, &c., be communicated under real signatures.
”The price of this _Gazette_ will be three dollars per annum. All advertis.e.m.e.nts inserted in it, and not exceeding twelve lines, will pay 4s. Quebec currency; and for every additional line a proportionable price. Orders for letter-press printing will be executed with neatness, despatch and attention, and on the most reasonable terms.”
An advertis.e.m.e.nt in the first number informs the public that a Brewery is about to be established under the sanction of the Lieutenant-Governor. ”Notice is hereby given, that there will be a Brewery erected here this summer under the sanction of His Excellency the Lieutenant-Governor, and encouraged by some of the princ.i.p.al gentlemen of this place; and whosoever will sow barley and cultivate their land so that it will produce grain of a good quality, they may be certain of a market in the fall at one dollar a bushel on delivery. W.
Huet, Niagara, 18th April, 1793.”
The number dated Niagara, May 2, 1793, ”hath” the following advertis.e.m.e.nt:--”Sampson Jutes begs leave to inform all persons who propose to build houses, &c., in the course of this summer, that he hath laths, planks and scantlings of all kinds to sell on reasonable terms.
Any person may be supplied with any of the above articles on the shortest notice. Applications to be made to him at his mill near Mr.
Peter Secord's.”
In the Number for May 30, 1793, we have ten guineas reward offered for the recovery of a Government grindstone:--”Ten Guineas Reward is offered to any person that will make discovery and prosecute to conviction, the Thief or Thieves that have stolen a Grindstone from the King's Wharf at Navy Hall, between the 30th of April and the 6th instant. John McGill, Com. of Stores, &c., &c., for the Province of Upper Canada. Queenstown, 16th May, 1793.”