CHAPTER IV 



JOSEPH KEELER VISITS THE HOME OF His ANCESTORS 



Joseph Keeler was essentially city-bred and, naturally enough, 

 though having heard of his father's people, had taken no par- 

 ticular interest in relatives, the nearest of whom were cousins 

 and country-bred. But now he had become charmed by the 

 recitals of that kindly past of which he had been reading, and 

 began to feel that in this life history of a part of his native 

 Province he had some personal interest. This was still more 

 increased by the discovery that it was his father's cousin, the 

 Hon. Joseph Keeler, who had taken such an important part 

 in the development of his home district. Perhaps, too, it may 

 unconsciously have come to his mind that it might not be 

 unprofitable even from a social standpoint to cultivate his 

 ancestral relationships, as Barnes Newcombe did the old 

 Colonel. So it came about that on the next holiday, which was 

 the Queen's birthday, he took his boy, Ernest, and, telling the 

 family he was going to Brighton for the day, went down on a 

 Saturday evening train to spend the two holidays. Often as 

 he had passed to Montreal on business, Joseph Keeler had never 

 stopped off at the Bay; so when on the Sunday morning they 

 strolled out along the lake beach, pushing their steps toward 

 PresquTsle Point, an emotion of delight not unmixed with 

 shame came over the man (who till now had needed no an- 

 cestors) , as he drank in the beauty of the scene and recalled the 

 memory of the old forgotten years, when "They were indeed 

 halcyon days." He could imagine the Bay covered with wild 

 fowl; the lines of seines, where salmon, white fish, pike and 

 pickerel weighed down the nets, supplying abundance for the 

 settlers, who had as yet few cattle for food. 



He pictured the place where old Grandfather Gibson was 

 building his schooner when burned by the Yankee pirate in 

 1812, and, telling these old tales to his boy, recalled the way- 

 laying of the mail-carrier, travelling rapidly by land-post from 



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