Canada and the Canadians, Vol. 2 | Page 4

changes and fluctuations, and the provincial work, originally undertaken to fix the entrance more permanently, was soon found inadequate to the rapid commercial undertakings of the country. Accordingly, a very large sum was granted by the Parliament for rendering it stable and increasing the width, which is now 180 feet, between substantial parallel piers.
There is a lighthouse at each end on the left side going in, but the work still requires a good deal of dredging, and the steamboat, although passing slowly and steadily, made a very great surge. In fact, it requires good steerage-way and a careful hand at the helm in rough weather.
The contractors made a railroad for five miles to the mountain, to fetch the stone for filling-in the piers.
The voyage across Burlington Bay is very pleasant and picturesque, the land being more broken, elevated, and diversified than in the lower portions of Canada West; and the Burlington Heights, so important a position in the war of 1812, show to great advantage. Here is one of the few attempts at castle-building in Canada called Dundurn Castle, the residence of Sir Allan Macnab. It is beautifully situated, and, although not perhaps very suitable to a new country, it is a great ornament to the vicinity of Hamilton, embowered as it is in the natural forest. Near it, however, is a vast swamp, in which is Coot's Paradise, so named, it is said, from a gentleman, who was fond of duck-shooting, or perhaps from the coot or water-hen being there in bliss.
Hamilton is a thriving town, exhibiting the rapid progress which a good location, as the Americans call it, ensures. The other day it was in the forest, to-day it is advancing to a city. It has, however, one disadvantage, and that is the very great distance from its port, which puts both the traveller and the merchant to inconvenience, causing expense and delay. How they manage, of a dark night, on the wharf to thread the narrow passage lined with fuel-wood for the steamboat I cannot tell; but, in the open daylight of summer, I saw a vehicle overturned and sent into the mud below. There is barely room for the stage or omnibus; and thus you must wait your turn amidst all the jostling, swearing, and contention, of cads, runners, agents, drivers, and porters; a very pleasant situation for a female or an invalid, and expecting every moment to have the pole of some lumber-waggon driven through your body.
Private interest here, as well as in so many other new places and projects in Canada, has evidently been at work, and a city a mile or two from its harbour, without sufficient reason, has been the result. But that will change, and the city will come to the port, for it is extending rapidly. The distance now is one mile and a quarter.
After great delay and a sharp look-out for carpet-bags and leather trunks, we arrived at Young's Hotel, a very substantial stone building, on a large scale, where civility and comfort made up for delay. It was English.
As it was night before we got settled, although a very fine night, and knowing that I should start before "Charles's Wain was over the new chimney," I sallied forth, with a very obliging guide, who acted as representative of the commissariat department, to examine the town.
The streets are at present straggling, but, as in most Canadian new towns, laid out wide and at right angles. The main street is so wide that it would be quite impracticable to do as they do in Holland, namely, sit at the door and converse, not sotto voce, with your opposite neighbour. It is in fact more like a Mall than a street, and should be planted with a double row of trees, for it requires a telescope to discover the numbers and signs from one row of houses and shops to the other.
Here the American custom of selling after dark by lamplight was everywhere visible, and everywhere new stone houses were building. I went into Peest's Hotel, now Weeks's, the American Tavern, and there saw indubitable signs that the men of yore had a pretty sprinkling of Yankees among them.
Hamilton has 4500 inhabitants, and is a surprising place, which will reach 10,000 people before two or three years more pass. It has already broad plank-walks, but they are not kept in very good repair; in fact, it cannot escape the notice of a traveller from the Old World that there is too magnificent a spirit at work in the commencement of this place, and that utility is sacrificed to enlargement.
Hamilton is beautifully situated on a sloping plane, at the foot of a wooded range of hills, called mountains, whence fine stone of very white colour in immense blocks is easily procured and