104 CANADIAN LOCAL HISTORY : 



alternately drooped and rose again round the whole structure and along the two sides of the 

 grand roadway up to the arch — all seen under a sky of pure azure, and Imthed in cheery sun- 

 light, surrounded too and thronged with a pleased multitude — constituted a spectacle not likely 

 to be forgotten. 



Turning down John Street a few chains, the curious observer may see on his left a particle of 

 the old area of York retaining several of its original natural features. In the portion of the 

 Macdonell-block not yet divided into building-slips we have a fragment of one of the many 

 sliallow ravines which meandered capriciously, every here and there, across the broad site of 

 the intended town. To the passer-by it now presents a refreshing bit of bowery meadow, out 

 of which towers up one of the grand elm-trees of the country, with stem of great heiglit and 

 girth, and head of very graceful form, whose healthy and undecayed limbs and long-trailing 

 branchlets, clearly shew that the huro.an regard whicli has led to the preservation liitherto of 

 this solitary survivor of the forest, has not been thrown away. This elm and the surroiinding 

 grove are still favorite stations or resting-places for our migratory birds. Here, for one place, 

 in the spring, are sure to be heard the first notes of the robin. 



At the south-east angle of the Macdonell block still stands in a good state of preservation the 

 mansion put up by the Hon. Alexander Macdonell. We have from time to time spoken of the 

 brick era of York. Mr. Macdonell's imposing old homestead may be described as belonging to 

 an immediately preceding era — the age of framed timber and weather-board, whicli followed 

 the primitive or hewn-log period. It is a building of two full storeys, each of considerable 

 elevation. A central portico with columns of the whole height of the house, gives it an air of 

 dignity. 



Mr. Macdonell was one more in that large group of military men who served in the American 

 Revolutionary war, under Col. Simcoe, and who were attracted to Upper Canada by the pros- 

 pects held out by that ofiicer when appointed Governor of the new colony. Mr. Macdonell was 

 the first Sheriff of the Home District. He represented in successive parliaments the Highland 

 constituency of Glengary, and was chosen Speaker of the House. He was afterwards sum- 

 moned to the Upper House. He was a friend and correspondent of the Earl of Selkirk, and 

 was desired by that zealous emigrational theorist to undertake the superintendence of the 

 settlement at Kildonan on the Red River. Though he declined this task, he undertook the 

 management of one of the other Highland settlements included in the Earl of Selkirk's scheme, 

 namely, that of Baldoon, on Lake St. Clair ; Mr. Douglas undertaking the care of that estab- 

 lislied at Moulton, at the mouth of the Grand River. Mr. Macdonell, in person rather tall and 

 thin, of thoughtful aspect, and in manner quiet and reserved, is one of the company of our 

 early wortliies whom we personally well remember. An interesting portrait of him exists in 

 the possession of his descendants : it presents him with his hair in powder, and otherwise in 

 the costume of " sixty years since." He died in 1842, "amid," a contemporary obituary speaks, 

 " the regrets of a community who loved him for the mild excellence of his domestic and private 

 charactar, no legs than they esteemed him as a public man." Mr. Miles Macdonell, the first 

 ■Governor of Assiniboia, under the auspices of the Hudson's Bay Company, and Alexander 

 Macdonell, the chief representative in 1816 of the rival and even hostile Company of the North 

 "West Traders of Montreal, were both near relations of Mr. Macdonell of York, as also was the 

 "barrister lost in the Speedy, and the well-known R. C. Bishop Macdonell. of Kingston. Col. 

 Macdonell, slain at Queenston, with General Brock, and whose remains are deposited beneath 

 the column there, was his brother. His son, Mr. Allan Macdonell, has on several occasions 

 stood forward as the friend and spirited advocate of the Indian Tribes, especially of the Lake 

 Superior region, on occasions when their interests, as native lords of the soil, seemed in danger 

 of being overlooked by the Government of the day. 



On Richmond Street a little to the west of the Macdonell block, was the town residence of 

 Col. Smith, some time President of the Province of Upper Canada. He was also allied to the 

 family of Mr. Macdonell. Col. Smith's original homestead was on the Lake Shore to the west, 

 in the neighbourhood of the river Etobicoke. Gourlay in his " Statistical Account of Upper 

 Canada," has chanced to speak of it. "I shall describe the residence and neighbourhood of 

 the President of Upper Canada from remembrance," he says, "journeying past it on my way 

 to York from the westward, by what is called the Lake Road through Etobicoke. For many 

 miles," he says, "not a house had appeared when I came to that of Colonel Smitli's, lonely and 



