A NIGHT AT NOBLE'S. 391 



average amount, the number of public casualties, which 

 the provincial authorities are required to repair. Hence 

 it is, I suppose, that, although the bridges I have spoken 

 of were burned in June or July, the Canadian Govern- 

 ment has as yet left them unrepaired. It is in winter, 

 also, that large timber for such works can be most 

 economically cut, and hauled from the place of its 

 growth to the spot where it is required. 



When this road was first opened and made a mail- 

 route, this station of Noble's and that of Brechut, on 

 Lake Metapediac, were fixed upon by the Provincial 

 Government, and the two present occupiers placed 

 in them, with small pensions, to keep open house for 

 strangers and to facilitate the weekly progress of the 

 post. This pension, much to his dissatisfaction, as he 

 was at pains to inform me, had been withdrawn from 

 Noble, but he still lingers in his wilderness home, sur- 

 rounded by a flourishing family, apparently ignorant of 

 serious privation, and receiving and accommodating 

 gladly any traveller who is willing to pay — a quality 

 the want of which, he assured me, was always to be sus- 

 pected when the guest had French Canadian blood in 

 his veins. I found myself therefore very comfortable 

 under his roof — as travelling goes in the wilderness. A 

 huge log-fire in the kitchen, tea I had brought with me 

 from Quebec, fish from the Metapediac — which flowed 

 past the house — potatoes from Noble's garden, new bread 

 baked on a hot plate for the occasion, and finally a 

 clean, and not uncomfortable bed, wound up the adven- 

 tures of the day. 



Saturday^ Oct. 6. — Rested and refreshed, I arose 

 at five ; and by six o'clock had breakfasted, and was 

 again on my way — as from Noble's to the ferry on the 

 Restigouche, I was assured, was a good twelve hours' 

 journey. 



From Noble's to the solitary hollow — for it cannot be 



