Navigating the Lower Saint Lawrence in the 19th Century.
| Of the inner rooms, one was twelve feet long by eight wide, with
sundry hanging cupboards. This formed the sleeping apartment of
seven officers, who lay, like the bog-trotters in Connemara, in a
"family-bed" on the floor. the mattresses which were saved from the
wreck were, at night, laid side by side on the floor, occupying the
whole length of the room. The locale of each owner's mattress was
indicated by his pillow, but the coverings, being scanty, were in
common. The third, still smaller room, was occupied by the commanding officer and his lady in a commodious cheque-curtained bed (the only one in the house) at one end, while the patriarch of the family, a venerable old man of ninety-five, and his ancient rib, at the other end, next led into the lower shelf of a lofty tier of berths, that rose one above the other to the roof, the other shelves being filled, in succession, to the top with a graduated scale of grandchildren and great-grandchildren. The whole interior of this house was dirty, black with smoke and hung with cobwebs, moccasins, fish and sundry other like commodities, having nothing of the neatness and cleanliness of the French Canadian houses in general. The family, however, though poor, were hospitable, kind-hearted and obliging. The old man seemed nearly in his dotage, and looked on in silent bewilderment at the uproar and confusion around him. The old dame, on the contrary, seemed to take special delight in the riot, and was the most active and thrifty of the household, bustling about from morning till night, with a broom in one hand and a bottle of rum in the other, keeping a keen account of the sundry glasses she disposed of to stray customers. The inmates of the mansion, when joined by our formidable party, consisted of about fifty person, including one lady, nine officers and their servants, the transport agent, the captain and mates of the Premier, the captain and mates of the other ship wrecked in our vicinity, a steward and black cook, with sundry other attendants and hangers-on, besides the patriarch and his wife, daughter-in-law, and son (to whom the house belonged), and three generations of children, of all ages and sexes, to say nothing of sundry cats, and numerous dogs, from the snarling cur, to the noble Newfoundland and Labrador dogs, of which there were two or three fine specimens. When you add to this formidable live stock all the light baggage of the officers, consisting of mattresses and blankets, trunks, portmanteaux, and carpet bags, coats, cloaks, swords, &c., the dining tables and chairs from the ship's cuddy, sundry articles of cabin stores, and provisions, saved from the wreck, such as hampers of hams, baskets of cheese, boxes of candles, loaves of sugar, canisters of tea, and cases of wine, thermometers, barometers, and Sympiesometers, sextants, chronometers, and Admiralty charts, &c., it will readily be believed that, in this dwelling at least, there was little space to spare. Nor were the sergeants, and soldiers, and their families, as may be supposed, a whit better off: all were equally crowded: and many, indeed, in other respects, were much worse "located". One company especially, the grenadiers, in a wretched frame-built barn, suffered severely from cold and damp. The open sides of the building gave admittance to the drifting snow, and the piercing wintry wind, with the thermometer sometimes below zero, whistled through the wide chinks and broken planks. But what most added to the misery, and, indeed, risk to health and life, in inhabiting this barn was, that the poor fellows were obliged to sleep on the damp unthreshed corn with which it was near half filled, so that when they lay down in their wet clothes, they soon became enveloped in a chilling vapour, the effects of which probably would have been fatal to many, were it not that the officer on duty had orders to arouse them from their sleep every two hours during the night, for the purpose of drying and warming themselves, by dancing around a huge blazing fire that was kept constantly burning on the bank outside. Amongst the various articles cast ashore by the surf were some chests and canisters of tea, and several bags of soaked biscuits, considered useless and thrown overboard. There being no bread for the men, and but very little flour, it was suggested, by Major Bennett, that this soaked biscuit might be reclaimed and made available for use. Two bakers were accordingly selected from amongst the soldiers, and immediately set to work to carry the experiment into effect. A bag of the biscuit pulp, thrown into a tub, was well washed in cold fresh water, which completely freed it of all saline flavour; the mass was then worked up into a dough, with a small quantity of good dry flour, in the proportion of one of the latter to three of the former; the dough was formed into the ordinary-sized ship-biscuits, and baked in a large oven, one of which is attached to every Canadian house, and, to the no small gratification of all parties, turned out as good and as sweet as when first issued from Her Majesty's stores. Had we remained some time longer at Cape Chatte, this discovery would have proved a most valuable one, as would the restoration of the salt-water-soaked tea, which was also supposed to have been completely spoiled, but which, on being washed in cold spring water, and dried in a blanket by the stove, was found to have lost nothing either of its strength or its flavour. The building at Cape Chatte, afforded such wretched and insufficient accommodations, that the commanding officer and I, a day or two after landing, visited St. Anne's, a somewhat larger fishing-village, nine miles east of Cape Chatte in search of further accommodation for the troops, not knowing how long we might be detained on this dreary coast. Here we found some tolerably good log and frame houses; and a number were selected, sufficient, if necessary, to quarter the whole wing of the regiment. |
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| G. R. Bossé©2001-03 | Page 25 | Chapter 1843 |
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