— 170 — 



over a locality, very familiar to every Quebecer, where 

 stood a massive stone mansion, razed, in 1871, to make 

 room for the present city post-office, on Buade street. 

 Over its chief entrance was, and is still visible, the 

 mysterious inscription, in old French, under a crouch- 

 ing dog gnawing a bone, the whole in gilt characters : 



" Je suis un chien qui ronge l'os, 

 En le rongeant, je prends mon repos ; 

 Un temps viendra qui n'est pas venu, 

 Que je morderai qui m'aura mordu." 



This inscription and tablet, ivhich was an enigma to 

 Capt. John Knox, of the 43rd, and was noticed in his 

 Diary of the Siege of Quebec in 1759, has been a hard 

 nut to crack to all our local antiquaries (1). Instead of 

 viewing it as a legend, some attempted to clothe it in 

 all the majestic drapery of history. 



The other incident embodied in this historical romance 

 relates the lawless amours of one of the most notorious 

 high officials, in the days of the Bourbon lily, Francois 

 Bigot, eleventh and last Intendant in Canada of the 

 French king. The story ends tragically. 



How did the novel originate, as the author is not a 

 Quebecer, but an active Collector of H. M.'s Customs 

 at the town of .Niagara. I am proud to say that two 

 sketches in my Maple Leaves for 1863, according to a 

 letter from Mr. Kirby, in my possession, furnished the 

 frame- work of this entrancing tale : The sketch of 

 the Golden Dog, a legend ; and also the History of 

 Chateau-Bigot, where the Canadian Lovelace immured 

 his " fair Eosamond. " Mr. Kirby, as an author, has 

 met with the same fate as many of his confreres in 

 Canada ; his volume has been remorselessly pillaged, 

 especially by United States writers. 



(1) The history of the Golden Dog appears in full in the 

 History of an old House, at p. 89 of Maple Leayes for 1873. 



