178 TRAVEL, ADVENTURE, AND SPORT. 



Quebec. On the following morning I accordingly 

 embark thereon, and have the luck to fall in with the 

 usual agremens of American travel viz., several 

 pretty young ladies, without incumbrances ; by 

 which term I mean parents, Men entendu, not chil- 

 dren. I have the additional good fortune for it is, 

 alas ! daily becoming rarer, even on the Mississippi 

 to witness an explosion. Another steamer has pre- 

 sumed to race with the "City of ," and our 



boiler has entered its protest against such audacity. 

 Canadians being a slower-going race than their neigh- 

 bours of the U.S., none of our party are killed or 

 even injured, with the exception of a young English 

 tourist recently imported to judge from his toilet, 

 regardless of expense who leaps overboard promptly 

 to shun the scalding water, and comes in in conse- 

 quence for a disagreeable amount of cold. However, 

 he is fished out, " not dead, but very wet," the ladies 

 cease praying and the gentlemen swearing or, by the 

 way, was the reverse the case? and we await in 

 patience the arrival of a tow-boat. While so doing I 

 have leisure to moralise over the philosophy of the 

 river habitues. When the explosion occurred, a young 

 bride, quitting her husband's arm, rushed up to an 

 old priest with whom I had been chatting, and ex- 

 claimed, " Priez, mon pere, mais priez done pour nous 

 nous mourons tous ! " The good Padre evinced no 

 inclination to comply with this request, and merely 

 replied, " Courage, mon enfant ! a arrive tous les 



