32 PROVINCIALISMS OF NOVA SCOTIA. 



On the Sunday I attended service in the Episcopal 

 church, and heard a sermon preached with a nasal twang 

 so perfect that I guessed the preacher must be a Yankee. 

 I was afterwards mortified to learn that he w^as a native 

 of St John in New Brunswick ; but I can honestly say 

 for New England, that neither in the pulpit nor out of 

 it did I meet, during my subsequent stay in the States, 

 with any one so handy at speaking through his nose as 

 .this unhappy preacher of Annapolis. 



The readers of Sam Slick naturally expect to hear 

 many provincial expressions when they come to Nova 

 Scotia. I was on the look-out for them ; but w4iether it 

 was that I did not fall in with any of the real blue-noses, 

 or that the Queen's English is really better used than I 

 had been led to expect, I scarcely heard a single pecu- 

 liarity of expression during my stay in the province. 

 Occasional guessings there were as to things which the 

 guesser knew perfectly well — as when a man guessed 

 his own age or his daughter's to be so-and-so, and 

 the not unfrequent use of " admire " instead of " wonder 

 at ;" but w^hat are these compared with our county pro- 

 vincialisms ? 



On Monday morning, the 13th of August, I embarked 

 in the steamer for St John in New Brunswick. The 

 weather was fine till we passed through the Digby Gut, 

 and were fairly into the Bay of Fundy. A cross sea 

 tossed us a little at the mouth of the gut, and by-and- 

 by the fogs, and finally the rains and gusts of this bay, 

 assailed us. The steamer was a poor affair, and among 

 other freight had some sheep on board, for which the 

 farmers of the Cornwallls and Annapolis districts find a 

 ready market at St John. The breadth of the passage 

 is about forty-five miles, which we accomplished by four 

 in the afternoon ; when I landed at St John, and took 

 up my quarters in the hotel. 



