156 CANADIAN LOCAL H [STORY. 



sidered it proper to take some spirited notice of the criticisms on tlie public acts of their 

 fathers, uncles and superiors generally, that ajipeared every week in the coliumis of the Colonial 

 Advocate; a violent act memorable in the annals of Western Canada, not simply as ha^-ing been 

 the means of establishing the fortunes of an indefatigable and powerful journalist, but more 

 notably as presenting an unconscious illustration of a general law, observable in the early 

 development of communities, whereby an eleuient destined to elevate and regenerate is, on its 

 first introduction, resisted, and sought to be crushed physically, not morally ; somewhat as the 

 white man's watch was dashed to pieces by the Indian, as though it had been a sentient thing, 

 conspiring in some mysterious way with other things, to promote the ascendancy of the stranger. 

 The youthful perpetrators of the violence referred to were not long in learning practically the 

 futility of such exploits. Good old Mr. James Baby, on handing to his son Eaymond the amount 

 which that youth was required to pay as his share of the hea\y damages awarded, as a matter 

 of course, by the jury on the occasion, is said to have added : — "There ! go and make one great 

 fool of yourself agaui !" — a sarcastic piece of advice that might have been offered to each of the 

 parties concerned.— A few steps northward, on the east side of 'Frederick Street, was the first 

 Post Office, on the premises of Mr. Allan, who was postmaster ; and southward, where this 

 street touches the water, was the Merchants' "Wharf, also the property of Mr. Allan ; and the 

 Custom House, where Mr. Allan was the Collector. In an eai-ly, Uniited condition of society, 

 a man of more than the ordinary aptitude for aflairs is required to act ia many capacities. The 

 Merchants' Wharf was the earliest landing-place for the larger craft of the lake. At a later 

 period other wharves or long wooden jetties, extending out into deep water, one of them named 

 the Farmers' Wharf, were built westward. In the shoal water between the several wharves, for a 

 long period, there was annually a dense crop of rushes or flags. The Town or County authori- 

 ties incurred considerable expense, year after year, in endeavouring to eradicate them — but, 

 like the heads of the hydi'a, they were always re-appearing. In July, 1S21, a "Mr. Coles' 

 account for his assistants' labour in destroying rushes in front of the Market Square " was laid 

 before tJie County magistrates, and audited, amounting to £13 Gs. Zd. lu August of the same 

 year, the minutes of the County Court record that "Capt. Macaulay, Royal Engineers, ofiered 

 to cut do'mi the rushes in fi'ont of the Tovm between the Merchants' Wharf and Coopers' Wliai-f, 

 for a smu not to exceed ninety doUars, which would merely be the expense of the men and 

 materials in executing the undertaking : his o'mi time he woidd give to the ijublic on this occa- 

 sion, as encoui'agement to others to endeavour to destroy the rushes wlien they become a 

 nuisance:" it was accordingly ordered "that ninety dollars be paid to Capt. Macaulay or his 

 order, for the purpose of cutting down the rushes, according to his verbal undertaking to cut 

 down the same, to be paid out of the Police or District fimds in the hands of the Treasurer of 

 the District." We have understood that Capt. Macaulay's measm-es for the extinction of the 

 rank vegetation in the shallow waters of the harboiu-, proved to be very efficient. The instru- 

 ment used was a kind oi screw grapnel, which, let down from the side of a large scow, laid hold 

 of the rushes at their root and forcibly wrenched them out of the bed of mud below. The entire 

 plant was thus lifted up, and di-awn by a windlass into the scow. When a fuU load of the aquatic 

 weed was collected, it was taken out into the open water of the Lalce, and there disposed of. 



Passing on our way, we soon came to the Market Square. This was a large open sjtace, with 

 wooden shambles in the middle of it, thu-ty-six feet long and twenty-four wide, running north 

 and south. In lS2i, the square was, by the direction of the County magistrates, closed in on 

 the east, west, and south sides, " with a pickettiug and oak ribbon, the pickets at teu feet dis- 

 tance fi-om each other, with three opening's or foot-paths on each side." The digging of a public 

 weU here, in the dii-ection of King Street, was an event of considerable interest in the town. 

 Groups of school-boys every day scanned narrowly the progress of the nndertalung : a cap of 

 one or the other of them, mischievously precipitated to the depths where the labourers' mat- 

 tocks were to be heard peeking at the shale below, may have impressed the execution of this 

 public work all the more indelibly on tlie recollection of some of them. By referring to a 

 voliuue of the Upper Canada Gazette we find that this was in 1S23. An unofficial advertisement 

 in that periodical, dated June the 9th, 1S23, calls for proposals to be sent in to the office of the 

 Clerk of the Peace, "for the sinking a well, stoning and sinking a pump therein, in the most 

 approved manner, at the Market Squ;u-e of the said tovra [of York], for the convenience of the 



