Thus closed a curious production in rhyme entitled Curiæ Canadenses, published anonymously in 1843, but written by Mr. John Rumsey, an English barrister, sometime domiciled here. In one place is described the migration of the Court of Chancery back from Kingston, whither it was for a brief interval removed, when Upper and Lower Canada were re-united. The minstrel says:

To the last three lines the following note is appended:—

The notes to Curiæ Canadenses teem with interesting matter relating to the laws, courts, terms, districts and early history, legal and general, of Lower as well as Upper Canada. A copious table of contents renders the volume quite valuable for reference. The author must have been an experienced compiler, analyst and legal index maker. In the text of the work, Christopher Anstey's poetical "Pleader's Guide" is taken as a model. As a motto to the portion of his poem that treats of Upper Canada he places the line of Virgil, "Gensque virûm truncis et duro robore nata," which may be a compliment or not. The title in full of Mr. Rumsey's brochure, which consists of only 127 octavo pages, is as follows:—"Curiæ Canadenses; or, The Canadian Law Courts: being a Poem, describing the several Courts of Law and Equity which have been erected from time to time in the Canadas; with copious notes, explanatory and historical, and an Appendix of much useful Matter. Itur in antiquam sylvam, stabula alta ferarum; Procumbunt piceæ, sonat icta securibus ilex, Fraxineæque trabes: cuneis et fissile robur Scinditur: advolvunt ingentes montibus ornos.—Virgil. By Plinius Secundus. Toronto: H. and W. Rowsell, King Street, 1843." The typography and paper are admirable. The Curiæ, in a jacket of fair calf, should be given a place on the shelves of our Canadian law libraries.

We pause for a moment at York Street, opposite the east wing of Osgoode Hall.

It rather puzzles one to conceive why York Street received its name. If a commemoration of the Duke of York of sixty years since was designed, the name of the whole town was that sufficiently already. Frederick Street, besides, recorded his specific Christian name, and Duke Street his rank and title. Although interesting now as a memento of a name borne of old by Toronto, York Street, when Toronto was York, might well have been otherwise designated, it seeming somewhat irrational for any particular thoroughfare in a town to be distinguished by the name of that town.—A certain poverty of invention in regard to street names has in other instances been evinced amongst us. Victoria Street, for example, was for a time called Upper George Street, to distinguish it from George Street proper, so named from George, Prince of Wales, the notable Prince Regent. It is curious that no other name but George should have been suggested for the second street; especially, too, as that street might have been so fittingly named Toronto Street, as being situated within a few feet of the line of the original thoroughfare of that name which figures so largely in the early descriptions of York.—If in "York Street" a compliment had been intended to Charles Yorke, Secretary at War in 1802, the orthography would have been "Yorke Street."

After all, however, the name "York Street" may have arisen from the circumstance that, at an early period, this was for teams on their way to York, the beaten track, suddenly turning off here to the south out of Dundas or Lot Street, the line of road which, if followed, would have taken the traveller to Kingston.

The street on the west of the grounds of Osgoode Hall is now known as University Street. By the donor to the public of the land occupied by the street, it was designated Park Lane—not without due consideration, as is likely. In London there is a famous and very distinguished Park Lane. It leads from Oxford Street to Piccadilly, and skirts the whole of the east side of Hyde Park. The position of what was our Park Lane is somewhat analogous, it being open along its whole length on the left to the plantations of an ornamental piece of ground. Unmeddled with, our Park Lane would have suggested from time to time in the mind of the ruminating wayfarer pleasant thoughts of a noble and interesting part of the great home metropolis. The change to University Street was altogether uncalled for. It ignored the adjoining "College Avenue," the name of which showed that a generally-recognized "University Street" existed already: it gave, moreover, a name which is pretentious, the roadway indicated being comparatively narrow.

Of the street on the east side of the grounds of Osgoode Hall we have already spoken. But in connection with the question of changes in street names, we must here again refer to it. In this case the name "Sayer" has been made to give place to "Chestnut." "Elm Street," which intersects this street to the north, probably in some vague way suggested a tree name. "Elm Street," however, had a reason for its existence. Many persons still remember a solitary Elm, a relic of the forest, which was long conspicuous just where Elm Street enters Yonge Street. And there is a fitness likewise in the names of Pine Street and Sumach Street, in the east; these streets, passing through a region where pines and sumachs once abounded. But the modern Chestnut Street has nothing about it in the past or present associated with chestnut trees of any kind. The name "Sayer" should have been respected.

It is unfortunate when persons, apparently without serious retrospective thought, have a momentary chance to make changes in local names. Chancery might well be invoked to undo in some instances what has been done, and to prohibit like inconsiderate proceedings in the future. Equity would surely say that a citizen's private right should be sustained, so long as it worked no harm to the community; and that perplexity in the registration and description of property should not needlessly be created.

Although we shall forestall ourselves a little, we may here notice one more alteration in a street-name near Osgoode Hall. William Street, immediately west of the Avenue leading to the University, has in recent times been changed to Simcoe Street. It is true, William Street was nearly in a line with the street previously known as Simcoe Street; nevertheless, starting as it conspicuously did somewhat to the west of that line, it was a street sufficiently distinct to be entitled to retain an independent name. Here again, an item of local history has been obliterated. William Street was a record on the soil of the first name of an early Chief Justice of Upper Canada, who projected the street and gave the land. Dummer Street, the next street westward, bears his second name.

Of "Powell," his third name we have already spoken elsewhere, and shall again almost immediately have to speak.

When it shall be proposed to alter the name of Dummer Street, with the hope, perhaps, of improving the fame of the locality along with its name, let the case of March Street be recalled. In the case of March Street, the rose, notwithstanding a change of name, retained its perfume: and the Colonial Minister of the day, Lord Stanley, received but a sorry compliment when his name was made to displace that of the Earl of March. (It was from this second title of the Duke of Richmond that March Street had its name.)—It is probable that the Dummer Street of to-day, like the March Street of yesterday, would, under another name, continue much what it is. In all such quarters, it is not a change of name that is of any avail: but the presence of the schoolmaster and home-missionary, backed up by landlords and builders, studious of the public health and morals, as well as of private interests.

Digression Northward at the College Avenue.

The fine vista of the College Avenue, opposite to which we have now arrived, always recalls to our recollection a certain bright spring morning, when on reaching school a whole holiday was unexpectedly announced; and when, as a mode of filling up a portion of the unlooked-for vacant time, it was agreed between two or three young lads to pay a visit to the place on Lot Street where, as the report had spread amongst us, they were beginning to make visible preparations for the commencement of the University of King's College. The minds of growing lads in the neighbourhood of York at that period had very vague ideas of what a University really was. It was a place where studies were carried on, but how or under what conditions, there was of necessity little conception. Curiosity, however, was naturally excited by the talk on the lips of every one that a University was one day to be established at York; and now suddenly we learned that actual beginnings were to be seen of the much-talked-of institution. On the morning of the fine spring day referred to, we accordingly undertook an exploration.

On arriving at the spot to which we had been directed, we found that a long strip of land running in a straight line northwards had been marked out, after the manner of a newly-opened side line or concession road in the woods. We found a number of men actually at work with axes and mattocks; yokes of oxen, too, were straining at strong ploughs, which forced a way in amongst the roots and small stumps of the natural brushwood, and, here and there, underneath a rough mat of tangled grass, bringing to light, now black vegetable mould, now dry clay, now loose red sand. Longitudinally, up the middle of the space marked off, several bold furrows were cut, those on the right inclining to the left, and those on the left inclining to the right, as is the wont in primitive turnpiking.

One novelty we discovered, viz., that on each side along a portion of the newly-cleared ground, young saplings had been planted at regular intervals; these, we were told, were horse-chestnuts, procured from the United States expressly for the purpose of forming a double row of trees here. In the neighbourhood of York the horse-chestnut was then a rarity.

Everywhere throughout the North American continent, as in the numerous newly-opened areas of the British Empire elsewhere on the globe's surface, instances, of course, abound of wonderful progress made in a brief interval of time. For ourselves, we seem sometimes as if we were moving among the unrealities of a dream when we deliberately review the steps in the march of physical and social improvement, which, within a fractional portion only of a retrospect not very extended, can be recalled, in the region where our own lot has been cast, and, in particular, in the neighbourhood where we are at this moment pausing.

The grand mediæval-looking structure of University College in the grounds at the head of the Avenue, continues to this day to be a surprise somewhat bewildering to the eye and mind, whenever it breaks upon our view. It looks so completely a thing of the old world and of an age long past away. To think that one has walked over its site before one stone was laid upon another thereon, seems almost like a mental hallucination.

A certain quietness of aspect and absence of overstrain after architectural effect give the massive pile an air of great genuineness. The irregular grouping of its many parts appears the undesigned result of accretion growing out of the necessities of successive years. The whole looks in its place, and as if it had long occupied it. The material of its walls, left for the most part superficially in the rough, has the appearance of being weather-worn. An impression of age, too, is given by the smooth finish of the surrounding grounds and spacious drives by which, on several sides, the building is approached, as also by the goodly size of the well-grown oaks and other trees through whose outstretched branches it is usually first caught sight of, from across the picturesque ravine.

Of the still virgin condition of the surrounding soil, however, we have some unmistakeable evidence in the ponderous granitic boulders every here and there heaving up their grey backs above the natural greensward, undisturbed since the day when they dropped suddenly down from the dissolving ice-rafts that could no longer endure their weight.

Seen at a little distance, as from Yonge Street for example, the square central tower of the University, with the cone-capped turret at its north-east angle, rising above a pleasant horizon of trees, and outlined against an afternoon sky, is something thoroughly English, recalling Rugby or Warwick. On a nearer approach, this same tower, combined with the portal below, bears a certain resemblance to the gateway of the Abbey of Bury St. Edmunds, as figured in Palgrave's "Anglo-Saxons;" and the elaborate and exquisite work about the recessed circular-headed entrance enables one to realize with some degree of certainty how the enriched front of that and other noble mediæval structures, seen by us now corroded and mutilated, looked when fresh from the hands that so cunningly carved them.

In the two gigantic blind-worms, likewise, stretched in terrorem on the sloping parapets of the steps leading to the door, benumbed, not dead; giving in their extremities, still faint evidence of life, we have a sermon in stone, which the brethren of a masonic guild of Wykeham's day would readily have expounded. As we enter a house devoted to learning and study, is it not fitting that the eye should be greeted with a symbol of the paralyzing power of Science over Ignorance and Superstition?

Moreover, sounds that come at stated intervals from that central tower, make another link of sympathy with the old mother-land. Every night at nine, "swinging slow with solemn roar," the great bell of the University is agreeably suggestive of Christ Church, Oxford, St. Mary's, Cambridge, and other places beyond the sea, which to the present hour give back an echo of the ancient Curfew.

And if to this day the University building, in its exterior aspect and accidents, is startling to those who knew its site when as yet in a state of nature, its interior also, when traversed and explored, tends in the same persons to produce a degree of confusion as between things new and old; as between Canada and elsewhere. Within its walls are to be seen appliances and conveniences and luxuries for the behoof and use of teacher and student, unknown a few years since in many an ancient seat of learning.

In a library of Old World aspect and arrangement, is a collection rich in the Greek and Latin Classics, in Epigraphy and Archæology, beyond anything of the kind in any other collection on this continent, and beyond what is to be met with in those departments in many a separate College within the precincts of the ancient Universities—a pre-eminence due to the tastes and special studies of the first president and other early professors of the Canadian Institution.

Strange, it is, yet true that hither, as to a recognized source of certain aid in identification and decipherment, are duly transmitted, by cast, rubbing and photograph, the "finds" that from time to time create such excitement and delight among epigraphists, and ethnologists, and other minute historical investigators in the British Islands and elsewhere.

There used to be preserved in the Old Hospital a model in cork and card-board, of the great educational establishment to which, in the first instance, the Avenue was expected to form an approach. It was very curious. Had it been really followed, a large portion of the park provided for the reception of the University would have been covered with buildings. A multitude of edifices, isolated and varying in magnitude, were scattered about, with gardens and ornamental grounds interspersed. These were halls of science, lecture-rooms, laboratories, residences for president, vice-president, professors, officials and servants of every grade. On the widely extended premises occupied by the proposed institution, a population was apparently expected to be found that would, of itself, have almost sufficed to justify representation in Parliament—a privilege the college was actually by its charter to enjoy. We should have had in fact realized before our eyes, on a considerable scale, a part of the dreams of Plato and More, a fragment of Atlantis and Utopia.

When the moment arrived, however, for calling into visible being the long contemplated seat of learning, it was found expedient to abandon the elaborate model which had been constructed. Mr. Young, a local architect, was directed to devise new plans. His ideas appear to have been wholly modern. Notwithstanding the tenor of the Royal Charter, which suggested the precedents of the old universities of "our United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland," wherever it should be practicable to follow them, the architecture and arrangements customary in those places were ignored. Girard College, Philadelphia, seems to have inspired the new designs. However, only a minute fragment of one of the buildings of the new plan was destined ever to exist.

The formal commencement of the abortive work took place on the 23rd of April, 1842—a day indelibly impressed on the memory of those who participated in the proceedings. It was one of the sunniest and brightest of days. In the year just named it happened that so early as St. George's day the leaves of the horse-chestnut were bursting their glossy sheaths, and vegetation generally was in a very advanced stage. A procession, such as had never before been seen in these parts, slowly defiled up the Avenue to the spot where the corner-stone of the proposed University was to be laid.

A highly wrought contemporary description of the scene is given in a note in Curiæ Canadenses: "The vast procession opened its ranks, and his Excellency the Chancellor, with the President, the Lord Bishop of Toronto, on his right, and the Senior Visitor, the Chief Justice, on his left, proceeded on foot through the College Avenue to the University grounds. The countless array moved forward to the sound of military music. The sun shone out with cloudless meridian splendour; one blaze of banners flushed upon the admiring eye.—The Governor's rich Lord-Lieutenant's dress, the Bishop's sacerdotal robes, the Judicial Ermine of the Chief Justice, the splendid Convocation robes of Dr. McCaul, the gorgeous uniforms of the suite, the accoutrements of the numerous Firemen, the national badges worn by the Office-bearers of the different Societies, and what on such a day (St. George's) must not be omitted, the Red Crosses on the breasts of England's congregated sons, the grave habiliments of the Clergy and Lawyers, and the glancing lances and waving plumes of the First Incorporated Dragoons, all formed one moving picture of civic pomp, one glorious spectacle which can never be remembered but with satisfaction by those who had the good fortune to witness it. The following stanza from a Latin Ode," the note goes on to say, "recited by Master Draper, son of the late Attorney-General, after the ceremony, expresses in beautifully classical language the proud occasion of all this joy and splendid pageantry:—

Another contemporary account adds: "As the procession drew nearer to the site where the stone was to be laid, the 43rd Regiment lined the way, with soldiers bearing arms, and placed on either side, at equal intervals. The 93rd Regiment was not on duty here, but in every direction the gallant Highlanders were scattered through the crowd, and added by their national garb and nodding plumes to the varied beauty of the animated scene. When the site was reached," this account says, "a new feature was added to the interest of the ceremony. Close to the spot, the north-east corner, where the foundation was to be deposited, a temporary building had been erected for the Chancellor, and there, accompanied by the officers of the University and his suite, he took his stand. Fronting this was a kind of amphitheatre of seats, constructed for the occasion, tier rising above tier, densely filled with ladies, who thus commanded a view of the whole ceremony. Between this amphitheatre and the place where the Chancellor stood, the procession ranged itself."

The Chancellor above spoken of was the Governor General of the day, Sir Charles Bagot, a man of noble bearing and genial, pleasant aspect. He entered with all the more spirit into the ceremonies described, from being himself a graduate of one of the old universities. Memories of far-off Oxford and Christ Church would be sure to be roused amidst the proceedings that rendered the 23rd of April, 1842, so memorable amongst us. A brother of Sir Charles' was at the time Bishop of Oxford. In his suite, as one of his Secretaries, was Captain Henry Bagot, of the Royal Navy, his own son. Preceding him in the procession, bearing a large gilded mace, was an "Esquire Bedell," like the Chancellor himself, a Christ Church man, Mr. William Cayley, subsequently a member of the Canadian Government.

Although breaking ground for the University building had been long delayed, the commencement now made proved to be premature. The edifice begun was never completed, as we have already intimated; and even in its imperfect, fragmentary condition, it was not fated to be for any great length of time a scene of learned labours. In 1856 its fortune was to be converted into a Female Department for the over-crowded Provincial Lunatic Asylum.

The educational system inaugurated in the new building in 1843 was, as the plate enclosed in the foundation-stone finely expressed it, "præstantissimum ad exemplar Britannicarum Universitatum." But the "exemplar" was not, in practice, found to be, as a whole, adapted to the genius of the Western Canadian people.

The revision of the University scheme with a view to the necessities of Western Canada, was signalized by the erection in 1857 of a new building on an entirely different site, and a migration to it bodily, of president, professors and students, without departing however from the bounds of the spacious park originally provided for the institution; and it is remarkable that, while deviating, educationally and otherwise, in some points, from the pattern of the ancient universities, as they were in 1842, a nearer approach, architecturally, was made to the mediæval English College than any that had been thought of before. Mr. Cumberland, the designer of the really fine and most appropriate building in which the University at length found a resting place, was, as is evident, a man after the heart of Wykeham and Wayneflete.

The story of our University is a part of the history of Upper Canada. From the first foundation of the colony the idea of some such seat of learning entered into the scheme of its organization. In 1791, before he had yet left England for the unbroken wilderness in which his Government was to be set up, we have General Simcoe speaking to Sir Joseph Banks, the President of the Royal Society, of "a college of a higher class," as desirable in the community which he was about to create. "A college of a higher class," he says, "would be eminently useful, and would give a tone of principles and of manners that would be of infinite support to Government." In the same letter he remarks to Sir Joseph, "My friend the Marquis of Buckingham has suggested that Government might allow me a sum of money to be laid out for a Public Library, to be composed of such books as might be useful in the colony. He instanced the Encyclopædia, extracts from which might occasionally be published in the newspapers. It is possible," he adds, "private donations might be obtained, and that it would become an object of Royal munificence."

It was naturally long before the community of Upper Canada was ripe for a college of the character contemplated; but provision for its ultimate existence and sustenance was made, almost from the beginning, in the assignment to that object of a fixed and liberal portion of the public lands of the country.

In 1819-20, Gourlay spoke of the unpreparedness of Upper Canada as yet for a seat of learning of a high grade. Meanwhile, as a temporary expedient, he suggested a romantic scheme. "It has been proposed," he says, "to have a college in Upper Canada; and no doubt in time colleges will grow up there. At present, and for a considerable period to come, any effort to found a college would prove abortive. There could neither be got masters nor scholars to ensure a tolerable commencement for ten years to come; and a feeble beginning might beget a feeble race of teachers and pupils. In the United States," he continued, "academies and colleges, though fast improving, are yet but raw; and greatly inferior to those in Britain, generally speaking. Twenty-five lads sent annually at public charge from Upper Canada to British Universities, would draw after them many more. The youths themselves, generally, would become desirous of making a voyage in quest of learning.—Crossing the ocean on such an errand would elevate their ideas, and stir them up to extraordinary exertions. They would become finished preachers, lawyers, physicians, merchants; and, returning to their native country, would repay in wisdom what was expended in goodness and liberality. What more especially invites the adoption of such a scheme is the amiable and affectionate connection which it would tend to establish between Canada and Britain. But it will not do at present to follow out the idea."

Gourlay's prediction that "in time colleges will grow up there" has been speedily verified. The town especially, of which in its infant state he spoke in such terms of contempt, has been so prolific of colleges that it is now become a kind of Salamanca for the country at large; a place of resort for students from all parts. It is well probably for Canada that the scheme of drafting a batch of young students periodically to the old country, was not adopted. Canada would thereby possibly, on the one hand, have lost the services of some of the cleverest of her sons, who, on obtaining academic distinction would have preferred to remain in the mother country, entering on one or other of the public careers to which academic distinction there opens the ready path; and, on the other hand, she should, in many an instance, it is to be feared, have received back her sons just unfitted, in temper and habit, for life under matter-of-fact colonial conditions.

In the original planting of the Avenue, up whose fine vista we have been gazing, the mistake was committed of imitating nature too closely. Numerous trees and shrubs of different kinds and habits were mingled together as they are usually to be seen in a wild primitive wood; and thus the growth and fair development of all were hindered. The horse-chestnuts alone should have been relied on to give character to the Avenue; and of these there should have been on each side a double row, with a promenade for pedestrians underneath, after the manner of the great walks in the public parks of the old towns of Europe.

XXII.

His policy was, as we know, very successful. Of the state of things at Toronto, and in Upper Canada generally, after the Union measure had been pushed through, he writes to a friend thus: "I have prorogued my Parliament," he says, "and I send you my Speech. Never was such unanimity! When the Speaker read it in the Commons, after the prorogation, they gave me three cheers, in which even the ultras united. In fact, as the matter stands now, the Province is in a state of peace and harmony which, three months ago, I thought was utterly hopeless."

In a private letter of the following year (1841), he alludes to his influence in these terms: "I am in the midst," he says, "of the bustle attending the opening of the Session, and have, besides, a ministerial 'crisis' on my hands. The latter I shall get through triumphantly, unless my wand, as they call it here, has lost all power over the members, which I do not believe to be the case." This was written at Kingston, where, it will be remembered, the seat of Government was established for a short time after the union of Upper and Lower Canada.

Through Poulett Thomson, Toronto for a few months and to the extent of one-half, was the seat of a modern feudal barony. On being elevated to the peerage, the Governor-General, who had carried the Union, was created Baron Sydenham of Sydenham in Kent and Toronto in Canada.

At one time it was expected that Toronto would be the capital of the United Province, but its liege lord pronounced it to be "too far and out of the way;" though at the same time he gives it as his opinion that "Kingston or Bytown would do." Thus in 1840, and in July, 1841, he writes: "I have every reason to be satisfied with having selected this place (Kingston) as the new Capital. There is no situation in the Province so well adapted for the seat of Government from its central position; and certainly we are as near England as we should be anywhere else in the whole of Canada. My last letters reached me," he says, "in fifteen days from London! So much for steam and railways." Being in very delicate health, it had been Lord Sydenham's intention to return to England in September, 1841. On the 5th of June he writes at Kingston to a friend: "I long for September, beyond which I will not stay if they were to make me Duke of Canada and Prince of Regiopolis, as this place is called." But he was never more to see England. On the 4th of the September in which he had hoped to leave Canada, he suffered a fracture of the right leg and other injury by a fall from his horse. He never rallied from the shock. His age was only 42.

The Park lot which follows that occupied by Chief Justice Powell was selected by Solicitor-General Gray, of whom fully already. It afterwards became the property of Mr. D'Arcy Boulton, eldest son of Mr. Justice Boulton, and was known as the Grange estate. The house which bears the name of the "Grange," was built at the beginning of the brick era of York, and is a favourable specimen of the edifices of that period. (Beverley House, just noted, was, it may be added, also built by Mr. D'Arcy Boulton.)

The Grange-gate, now thrust far back by the progress of improvement, was long a familiar landmark on the line of Lot-street. It was just within this gate that the fight already recorded took place between Mr. Justice Boulton's horses, Bonaparte and Jefferson, and the bears. A memorandum of Mr. G. S. Jarvis, of Cornwall, in our possession, affirms that Mr. Justice Boulton drove a phaeton of some pretensions, and that his horses, Bonaparte and Jefferson, were the crack pair of the day at York. As to some other equipages he says: "The Lieut. Governor's carriage was considered a splendid affair, but some of the Toronto cabs would now throw it into the shade. The carriage of Chief Justice Powell, he adds, was a rough sort of omnibus, and would compare with the jail van used now." (We remember Bishop Strachan's account of a carriage sent up for his own use from Albany or New York; it was constructed on the model of the ordinary oval stage coach, with a kind of hemispherical top.)

To our former notes of Mr. Justice Boulton, we add, that he was the author of a work in quarto published in London in 1806, entitled a "Sketch of the Province of Upper Canada."

John Street, passing south just here, is, as was noted previously, a memorial, so far as its name is concerned, of the first Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada. On the plan of the "new town," as the first expansion westward, of York, was termed,—while this street is marked "John," the next parallel thoroughfare eastward is named "Graves," and the open square included between the two, southward on Front Street, is "Simcoe-place." The three names of the founder of York were thus commemorated. The expression "Simcoe-place" has fallen into disuse. It indicated, of course, the site of the present Parliament Buildings of the Province of Ontario. Graves Street has become Simcoe Street, a name, as we have seen, recently extended to the thoroughfare northward, with which it is nearly in a right line, viz., William Street, which previously recorded, as we have said, the first Christian name of Chief Justice Powell. The name "John Street" has escaped change. The name sounds trivial enough; but it has an interest.

In the minds of the present generation, with John Street will be specially associated the memorable landing of the Prince of Wales at Toronto in 1860. At the foot of John Street, for that occasion, there was built a vast semi-colosseum of wood, opening out upon the waters of the Bay; a pile whose capacious concavity was densely filled again and again, during the Prince's visit, with the inhabitants of the town and the population of the surrounding country. And on the brow of the bank, immediately above the so-called amphitheatre, and exactly in the line of John Street, was erected a finely designed triumphal arch, recalling those of Septimus Severus and Titus.

This architectural object, while it stood, gave a peculiarly fine finish to the vista, looking southward along John Street. The usually monotonous water-view presented by the bay and lake, and even the common-place straight line of the Island, seen through the frame-work of three lofty vaulted passages, acquired for the moment a genuine picturesqueness. An ephemeral monument; but as long as it stood its effect was delightfully classic and beautiful. The whole group—the arch and the huge amphitheatre below, furnished around its upper rim at equal intervals with tall masts, each bearing a graceful gonfalon, and each helping to sustain on high a luxuriant festoon of evergreen which 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 bathed in cheery sunlight, 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 shallow 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 height and girth, and head of very graceful form, whose healthy and undecayed limbs and long trailing branchlets, clearly show that the human regard which has led to the preservation hitherto of this solitary survivor of the forest has not been thrown away. This elm and the surrounding grove are still favourite 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-west 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, which 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 prospects held out by that officer 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 summoned 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 established 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 worthies 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 the regrets of a community who," to adopt the language of a contemporary obituary, "loved him for the mild excellence of his domestic and private character, no less 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 Smith, lonely and desolate. It had once been genteel and comfortable; but was now going to decay. A vista had been opened through the woods towards Lake Ontario; but the riotous and dangling undergrowth seemed threatening to retake possession from the Colonel of all that had once been cleared, which was of narrow compass. How could a solitary half-pay officer help himself," candidly asks Gourlay, "settled down upon a block of land, whose very extent barred out the assistance and convenience of neighbours? Not a living thing was to be seen around. How different might it be, thought I, were a hundred industrious families compactly settled here out of the redundant population of England!"

"The road was miserable," he continues; "a little way beyond the President's house it was lost on a bank of loose gravel flung up between the contending waters of the lake and the Etobicoke stream." He here went astray. "It was my anxious wish," he says, "to get through the woods before dusk; but the light was nearly gone before the gravel bank was cleared. There seemed but one path, which took to the left. It led me astray: I was lost: and there was nothing for it but to let my little horse take his own way. Abundant time was afforded for reflection on the wretched state of property flung away on half-pay officers. Here was the head man of the Province, 'born to blush unseen,' without even a tolerable bridle-way between him and the capital city, after more than twenty years' possession of his domain. The very gravel-bed which caused me such turmoil might have made a turnpike, but what can be done by a single hand? The President could do little with the axe or wheelbarrow himself; and half-pay could employ but few labourers at 3s. 6d. per day with victuals and drink." He recovers the road at length, and then concludes: "after many a weary twist and turn I found myself," he says, "on the banks of the Humber, where there was a house and a boat."

Col. Smith did something, in his day, to improve the breed of horses in Upper Canada. He expended considerable sums of money in the importation of choice animals of that species from the United States.

The house which led us to this notice of President Smith is, as we have said, situated on Richmond Street. On Adelaide Street, immediately south of this house, and also a little west of the Macdonell block, was a residence of mark, erected at an early period by Mr. Hugh Heward, and memorable as having been the abode for a time of the Naval Commissioner or Commodore, Joseph Bouchette, who first took the soundings and constructed a map of the harbour of York. His portrait is to be seen prefixed to his well-known "British Dominions in North America." The same house was also once occupied by Dr. Stuart, afterwards Archdeacon of Kingston; and at a later period by Mrs. Caldwell, widow of Dr. Caldwell, connected with the Naval establishment at Penetanguishene. Her sons John and Leslie, two tall, sociable youths, now both deceased, were our classmates at school. We observe in the Oracle of Saturday, May 28, 1803, a notice of Mr. Hugh Heward's death in the following terms: "Died lately at Niagara, on his way to Detroit, after a lingering illness, Mr. Hugh Heward, formerly clerk in the Lieutenant-Governor's office, and a respectable inhabitant of this town (York)."

Just beyond was the abode of Lieut. Col. Foster, long Adjutant General of Militia; an officer of the antique Wellington school, of a fine type, portly in figure, authoritative in air and voice; in spirit and heart warm and frank. His son Colley, also, we here name as a congenial and attached schoolboy friend, likewise now deceased, after a brief but not undistinguished career at the Bar.

A few yards further on was the home of Mr. John Ross, whose almost prescriptive right it gradually became, whenever a death occurred in one of the old families, to undertake the funeral obsequies. Few were there of the ancient inhabitants who had not found themselves at one time or another, wending their way, on a sad errand, to Mr. Ross's doorstep. On his sombre and very unpretending premises were put together the perishable shells in which the mortal remains of a large proportion of the primitive householders of York and their families are now reverting to their original dust. Almost up to the moment of his own summons to depart hence, he continued to ply his customary business, being favoured with an old age unusually green and vigorous, like "the ferryman austere and stern," Charon; to whom also the "inculta canities" of a plentiful supply of hair and beard, along with a certain staidness, taciturnity and rural homeliness of manner and attire, further suggested a resemblance. Many things thus combine to render Mr. John Ross not the least notable of our local dramatis personæ. He was led, as we have understood, to the particular business which was his usual avocation, by the accident of having been desired, whilst out on active service as a militiaman in 1812, to take charge of the body of Gen. Brock, when that officer was killed on Queenston Heights.

While in this quarter we should pause too for a moment before the former abode of Mr. Robert Stanton, sometime King's Printer for Upper Canada, as noted already; afterwards editor of the Loyalist; and subsequently Collector of Customs at York:—a structure of the secondary brick period, and situated on Peter Street, but commanding the view eastward along the whole length of Richmond Street. Mr. Stanton's father was an officer in the Navy, who between the years 1771 and 1786 saw much active service in the East and West Indies, in the Mediterranean, at the siege of Gibraltar under General Elliott, and on the American coast during the Revolutionary war. From 1786 to 1828 he was in the public service in several military and civil capacities in Lower and Upper Canada. In 1806 he was for one thing, we find, issuer of Marriage Licences at York. From memoranda of his while acting in this capacity we make some extracts. The unceremoniousness of the record in the majority of cases, is refreshing. The names are all familiar ones in Toronto. The parties set down as about to pledge their troth, either to other, had not in every instance, in 1872, passed off the scene.

1806, Nov. 26, Stephen Heward to Mary Robinson. Same date, Ely Playter to Sophia Beaman. Dec. 11, same year, Geo. T. Denison to C. B. Lippincott. 1807, Feb. 3, Jordan Post to M. Woodruffe. July 13, Hiram Kendrick to Hester Vanderburg. Dec. 28, Jarvis Ashley to Dorothy McDougal. 1808, Jan. 13, D'Arcy Boulton, Jun., to Sally Ann Robinson. March 17, James Finch to M. Reynolds. April 9, David Wilson to Susannah Stone. May 2, John Langstaff to Lucy Miles. May 30, John Murchison to Frances Hunt. August 8, John Powell, Esq., to Miss Isabella Shaw. Sept. 12, Hugh Heward to Eliza Muir. 1809, April 14, Nicholas Hagarman to Polly Fletcher. May 18, William Cornwall to Rhoda Terry. June 19, John Ashbridge to Sarah Mercer. June 21, Jonathan Ashbridge to Hannah Barton. July 15, Orin Hale to Hannah Barrett. Aug. 5, Henry Drean to Jane Brooke. Dec. 14, John Thompson to Ann Smith. 1810, March 8, Andrew Thomson to Sarah Smith. March 30, Isaac Pilkington to Sarah McBride. June 2, Thomas Bright to Jane Hunter. July 3, John Scarlett to Mary Thomson. Sept. 10, William Smith to Eleanor Thomson. June 22, William B. Sheldon to Jane Johnson. July 30, Robert Hamilton, gent., to Miss Maria Lavinia Jarvis. 1811, Sept. 20, George Duggan to Mary Jackson.

In one or two instances we are enabled to give the formal announcement in the Gazette and Oracle of the marriage for which the licence issued by Mr. Stanton was so curtly recorded. In the paper of Jan. 27, 1808, we have: "Married, on the 13th instant, by the Rev. G. O. Stuart, D'Arcy Boulton, jun., Esq., barrister, to Miss Sarah Robinson, second daughter of the late C. Robinson, Esq., of York."

And in the number for August 13, in the same year we read: "Married by the Rev. G. O. Stuart, on Monday the 8th instant, John Powell, Esq., to Miss Shaw, daughter of the Hon. Æneas Shaw, of this place (York)." To this announcement the editor, as we suppose, volunteers the observation: "This matrimonial connexion of the amiable parties we think replete with, and we wish it productive of, the most perfect human happiness."

A complimentary epithet to the bride is not unusual in early Canadian marriage notices. In the Gazette and Oracle of Dec. 29, 1798, we have a wedding in the Playter family recorded thus: "Married last Monday, Mr. James Playter to the agreeable Miss Hannah Miles, daughter of Mr. Abner Miles of this town." In the same paper for Feb. 24, 1798, is the announcement: "Married in this town (Niagara), by the Rev. Mr. Burke, Captain Miles Macdonell of the Royal Canadian Volunteers, to the amiable Miss Katey Macdonell." (This union was of brief duration. In the Constellation of Sept 6, 1799, we observe: "Died lately at Kingston, Mrs. Macdonell, of this town (Niagara), the amiable consort of Captain Miles Macdonell of the Canadian Volunteers.")

Again: in the Gazette and Oracle for Saturday Oct, 26, 1799: "Married, last Monday, by the Rev. Mr. Addison, Colonel Smith, of the Queen's Rangers, to the most agreeable and accomplished Miss Mary Clarke." (This was the Col. Smith who subsequently was for a time President of Upper Canada.)

In the Constellation of Nov. 23, 1799, in addition to the complimentary epithet, a poetical stanza is subjoined: thus: "Married at the seat of the Hon. Mr. Hamilton, at Queenston, on Sunday last, Mr. Thomas Dickson, merchant, to the amiable Mrs. Taylor, daughter of Captain Wilkinson, commanding, Fort Erie.