AUX SABLE CREEK LONDON. 177 



him at Goderich, where his local knowledge, joined to his 

 sound sense, would have rendered him a most desirable com 

 panion. 



It had rained pretty heavily in the afternoon, and we 

 reached an inn at Aux Sable creek, hungry and wet. In a 

 miserable log-house of two apartments, ten travellers passed 

 the night, partly in beds and partly on the floor. The door 

 was a collection of open boards, and the w^alls and roof ad 

 mitted air and light in all directions. The bed which I occu 

 pied, in common with my friend, was hard and uneven, and I 

 arose from it unrefreshed. The morning was so cold that I 

 could hardly warm myself by walking, and the rays of a 

 cloudless sun were courted for warmth at mid-day. After 

 travelling nearly seven hours we made seventeen miles, at the 

 end of which I enjoyed the company of an old Irishwoman, 

 cooking pork, potatoes, apples, and tea to breakfast, for a 

 party which had travelled together from Aux Sable creek. 

 This old lady and her husband had been thirteen years on a 

 farm of 150 acres, eighty of which were cleared, and every 

 thing around them looked comfortable. I joined two reapers, 

 and cut a few sheaves in a very fine field of oats, which I was 

 told had been cropped for twelve successive years without an 

 application of manure. After resting the horses, we pro 

 ceeded on our journey to London. 



About noon of the preceding day, I had some conversation 

 with a shipbuilder from Essex, in England, settled on the 

 London road in the Huron tract, and at whose dwelling I 

 made an unsuccessful application for something to eat. Like 

 most settlers, he was full of hope, and extolled the fertility of 

 his soil. On remarking to him that his wheat crop, which 

 had been sown in spring, was destroyed by mildew, he reluc 

 tantly admitted the fact, and added that he was assured mil 

 dew did not visit the district above once in twenty years ; 

 not perhaps.being aware that I knew the district had only 

 been inhabited three or four years, and not even visited by a 

 white person more than six years previous to the time of our 

 conversation. Some of this person s family had a sickly ap 

 pearance, and on questioning him if any of them ever had 



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