150 GRAND RIVER CROPS. 



of moisture afforded the plants by evaporation, and which is 

 the more abundant on moderate-sized rivers in a country like 

 America, where the temperature of day and night varies con 

 siderably. 



The greater part of the crops had been carried, and those 

 of wheat remaining in the field appeared particularly shabby, 

 compared with those of Britain, being thin on the ground and 

 short in the sheaf. I examined a cradler at work in an oat- 

 field, who was making good work, cutting low, and laying 

 down the ears with regularity. The implement is brought 

 round with a full and awkward-looking sweep, nine or ten 

 feet wide, and jerked so as to throw off the stalks, the 

 whole of which are collected in the cradle. By this mode 

 of operating, the cradler supports the weight of the crop col 

 lected in the sweep on his arms, and receives no relief from 

 any part of the cut crop, or implement resting on the ground, 

 as in [the case of mowing grass with the common scythe of 

 Britain : a heavy crop of grain must, therefore, be particularly 

 fatiguing to the cradler. 



We found Mr W at home, who had been expecting us 



for a day or two, in consequence of having been written to. 

 He had been known to us all when in Edinburgh, which he 

 left in the previous month of March, and had only been a few 

 weeks in his present situation in the Nellis Settlement on the 

 Grand River. He had purchased six or seven hundred acres, 

 about seventy of which were cleared, and there was a good 

 house, in the Canadian sense of the word, on the property. 

 For some time after the purchase, he resided with the former 

 proprietor, who only left the house a few days before our 

 arrival. His household establishment consisted of a newly- 

 imported Scotch ploughman ; and as our host had not himself 

 been accustomed to house-keeping at any period of his life, 

 the house may have justly been termed Bachelor Hall. The 

 evening was spent in walking over the property, and admiring 

 the beauty of the situation. Next morning Mr W - ex 

 plained the peculiarity of his circumstances with regard to 

 household matters, which were temporary, and excited in all 

 of us mirth instead of regret. The breakfast table was laid 

 out with the only animal substance in the house, a large bone 



