THE HAMILTON ASSOCIATION. 1 7 



abundance of fish — sturgeon, pike, pickerel and maskinonge — in the 

 river, and game in the woods. 



Returning down the river through several Indian villages, he 

 stopped the first night at the house of W. Young, a half-pay officer 

 married to a squaw ; next day crossed a forest of twenty miles with- 

 out a settler, stopped at Mr. Andrew Patton's, called at Major 

 Tinbrook's and dined at Squire McNab's. This Mr. McNab (not a 

 relative of Sir Allan's), he says, " is a gentleman of genteel and inde- 

 pendent property — is a justice of the peace, which gives him the title 

 of squire, and a member of the land board." He further describes 

 their arrival at the Fort of Niagara, and going on to Chippawa for a 

 dance the same night. 



Burlington Bay was a favorite fishing ground of Brant's tribe 

 at the seasons of the year when wild duck and fish were most abun- 

 dant, and the chief having obtained a grant of 600 acres bordering 

 the north-east angle of the bay, established his next and final resi- 

 dence there, where he died in 1807. 



Besides the Indians who came to Canada at the close of the 

 American revolution, numbers of loyalists who, through the war, had 

 espoused the side of the British and preferred still to be sheltered by 

 the old flag, also came over and commenced settling along the 

 frontier and gradually extending into the interior. Governor Simcoe, 

 first governor of Ontario (or Upper Canada), arrived at Niagara, then 

 called Newark, in 1791, and established his government, afterwards 

 in 1796 removing to Toronto, then Little York, described at the 

 time as a miserable collection of shanties, It bore the title of Little 

 York till 18 1 7, when a change to Toronto was made, lest it might 

 be confounded with New York. One of Governor Simcoe's first acts 

 was to send out surveyors, who laid out districts and counties, 

 liberally distributing among them names of places in Yorkshire, such 

 as Barton, Flamboro', Ancaster, etc. 



It is not pleasant to remember that human slavery once cast its 

 dark shadow on this beautiful province ; and as I have mentioned 

 that Chief Brant held slaves, a fact which some may be unwilling to 

 believe, it may be necessary for me to state that a mild patriarchal 

 form of slavery existed in Canada at this period — was permitted, 

 indeed, from the date of the proclamation of King Louis in 1689 to 

 that of the Imperial act of 1833, which freed the slaves of the 

 British West Indies and embraced those of Canada likewise. 



