448 CANADIAN LOCAL HISTORT: 



LII.-YONQB STREET PROM RICHMOND HILL TO BOND'S LAKE. 



A short distance beyond Richmond Hill was the abode of Colonel Moodie, on the nghfc,. 



distinguished by a flag-staflf in front of it, after the custom of Lower Canada, where an ofiBoer's.. 



house used to be known in this way. (In the neighbourhood of Sorel, as we remember, in the 



■winter of 1837, it was one of the symptoms of disaffection come to a head, when in front of a 



substantial habitan's home a flag-staff was suddenly seen bearing the inscription " , 



Capitaine, elu par le peuple.") Colonel Moodie's title came from his rank in the regular array. 

 He had been Lieut.-Colonel of the 104th regiment. Sad that a distinguished officer, after- 

 escaping the perils of the Peninsular war and of the war with the United States, here in 

 1812-13, should have yet, nevertheless, met with a violent death in a petty local civil tumult. 

 He was shot, as all remember, in the troubles ol 1S37, while attempting to ride past Montgom- 

 ery's, regardless of the insurgent challenge to stop. 



"Thou might'st have dreamed of brighter hours to close thy chec|.uered life 

 Beneath thy country's victor-flag, sure beacon iu the strife ; 

 Or in the shadow of thy home with those who mourn thee now, 

 To whisper comfort in thine ear, to calm thine aged brow. 

 Well ! peaceful be thy changeless rest, —thine is a soldier's grave : 

 Hearts like thine own shall mourn thy doom — meet requiem for the brave — 

 And ne'er 'tiU Freedom's ray is pale and Valour's pulse grown cold 

 Shall be thy bright career forgot, thy gloomy fate untold." 



So sang one in the columns of a local contemporary paper, in " Lines suggested by the- 

 Lamented Death of the late Colonel Moodie," 



At a certain period in the history of Tange Street, as indeed of all the other leading; 

 thoroughfares of Upper Canada, about 1830-33, a frequent sign that property had changed 

 hands, and that a second wave of population was rolling in, was the springing up, at intervals, 

 of houses of an improved style, with surroundings, lawns, sheltering plantations, winding 

 drives, well-constructed entrance-gates, and so on, indicating an appreciation of the elegant 

 and the comfortable. "We recall two instances of this, which we used to contemplate with 

 particular interest, a little way beyond Richmond HiU, on the left : the cosy, English-looking 

 residences, not far apart, with a cluster of appurtenances round each— of Mr. Larratt Smith, 

 and Mr. Francis Boyd. Both gentlemen settled here with their families in 1836. Mr. Smith 

 had been previously in Canada in a military capacity during the war of 1812-13, and for many 

 years subsequently he had been Chief Commissary of the Field Train Department and Pay- 

 master of the Artillery. He died at Southampton in 1860. Mr. Boyd, who emigrated hither 

 from the county of Kent, was one of the first, in these parts, to import from England improved 

 breeds of cattle. In his house was to be seen a collection of really fine paintings, amongst 

 them a Holbein, a Teniers, a Domenichino, a Sniirke, a Wilkie, and two Horace Vernets. The 

 families of Mr. Boyd and Mr. Smith were related by marriage. Mr. Boyd died in Toronta 

 in 1861. 



Beyond Mr. Boyd's, a solitary house, on the same side of Tonge Street, lying back near the 

 ■woods, used to be eyed askance in passing : — its occupant and proprietor. Mr. Kinnear, had in 

 1843 been murdered therein by his man-servant, assisted by a female domestic. It was 

 imagined by them that a considerable sum of money had just been brought to the house by 

 Mr. Kinnear. Both criminals would probably have escaped justice had not Mr. F. C. Capreol, 

 of Toronto, on the spur of the moment, and purely from a sense of duty to the public, under- 

 taken their capture, which he cleverly effected at LeAviston in the United States. 



The land now began to be somewhat broken as we ascended the rough and long-uncultivated 

 region known as the Oak Ridges. The predominant tree in the primitive forest here was the 

 pine, which attained a gigantic size ; but specimens of the black oak were intermingled. Down 

 in one of the numerous clefts and chasms winch were to be seen in this locality, in a woody- 

 dell on the right, was Bond's Lake, a pretty crescent-shaped sheet of water. We have the 

 surrounding property offered for sale iti a Gazette of 1805, in the following terms : " For Sale : 

 lots No. 62 and 63, in the first concession of the township of Whitchurch, on the east side of 

 Yonge Street, containing 380 acres of land : a deed in fee siniple will be given by the subscriber 

 to any person inclined to purchase. Johnson Butler. N.B. The above lots include the whole 

 of the Pond commonly called Bond's Lake, the house and clearing round the same. For 

 particulars inquire of Mr. R. Ferguson and Mr. T. B. Gough at York, and the subscriber at 

 Niagara. March 23, 1805J' 



