54 



ONTARIO. 



of hotel it was, he made the following mysterious reply : 

 " First-rate, when Dickey's not on the beer." In my 

 innocence I imagined that any hotel or house, " even if 

 Dickey was on the beer," would be all right. I soon found 

 my mistake. On arrival at the "hotel," I opened the 

 door of a comfortable-looking house, and was on the point 

 of ordering supper, when an immense fellow, brandishing 

 the leg of a chair, and backed up by half-a-dozen drunken 

 companions, made at me, and with terrific threats ordered 

 me out. A man who is half frozen, as well as tired and 

 hungry, is not much in the humour to fight, so "I 

 retired." My driver had already made off. He told me 

 afterwards that Dickey had once killed a hungry traveller, 

 but that when not "on the beer" he was one of the 

 whitest men on the earth. 



The book-keeping at some of these little country hotels 

 is very primitive. Here is a specimen, with the trans- 

 lation. Dates, as may be seen, are quite unnecessary. 



Hotel Book. 

 John Smith .. L 



Totel .. 10 grubbes & fore sleeps. 



Translation. 

 John Smith, " a grub and a sleep." 



two grubs and a sleep. 



three do. do. 



four do. do. 



Probably J. S. had a friend with 

 him on this occasion. 



The cost of " a grub " and " a sleep " being the same, 

 viz. 25 cents, making up the accounts is an easy 

 matter. 



Ontario is unquestionably the best province in the 

 Dominion to which the agricultural labourer can emi- 

 grate. It costs emigrants no more to go to Toronto than 



