The Canadian Brothers | Page 3

Amherstburg was at that
time one of the loveliest spots that ever issued from the will of a
beneficent and gorgeous nature, and were the world-disgusted wanderer
to have selected a home in which to lose all memory of artificial and
conventional forms, his choice would assuredly have fallen here. And
insensible, indeed, to the beautiful realities of the sweet wild solitude
that reigned around, must that man have been, who could have gazed
unmoved, from the lofty banks of the Erie, on the placid lake beneath
his feet, mirroring the bright starred heavens on its unbroken surface, or
throwing into full and soft relief the snow white sail, and dark hull of
some stately war-ship, becalmed in the offing, and only waiting the
rising of the capricious breeze, to waft her onward on her THEN
peaceful mission of dispatch. Lost indeed to all perception of the
natural must he have been, who could have listened, without a feeling
of voluptuous melancholy, to the plaintive notes of the whip-poor-will,
breaking on the silence of night, and harmonising with the general
stillness of the scene. How often have we ourselves, in joyous boyhood,
lingered amid these beautiful haunts, drinking in the fascinating song of
this strange night-bird, and revelling in a feeling we were too young to
analyze, yet cherished deeply--yea, frequently, even to this hour, do we
in our dreams revisit scenes no parallel to which has met our view,
even in the course of a life passed in many climes; and on awaking, our
first emotion is regret that the illusion is no more.

Such was Amherstburg, and its immediate vicinity, during the early
years of the present century, and up to the period at which our story
commences. Not, be it understood, that even THEN the scenery itself
had lost one particle of its loveliness, or failed in aught to awaken and
fix the same tender interest. The same placidity of earth, and sky, and
lake remained, but the whip-poor-will, driven from his customary
abode by the noisy hum of warlike preparation, was no longer heard,
and the minds of the inhabitants, hitherto disposed, by the quiet
pursuits of their uneventful lives, to feel pleasure in its song, had eye
nor ear for aught beyond what tended to the preservation of their
threatened homes.
Let us, however, introduce the reader more immediately to the scene.
Close in his rear, as he stands on the elevated bank of the magnificent
river of Detroit, and about a mile from its point of junction with Lake
Erie, is the fort of Amherstburg, its defences consisting chiefly of
stockade works, flanked, at its several angles, by strong bastions, and
covered by a demi lune of five guns, so placed as to command every
approach by water. Distant about three hundred yards on his right is a
large, oblong square building, resembling in appearance the red low
roofed blockhouses peering above the outward defences of the fort.
Surrounding this, and extending to the skirt of the thinned forest, the
original boundary of which is marked by an infinitude of dingy half
blackened stumps, are to be seen numerous huts or wigwams of the
Indians, from the fires before which arises a smoke that contributes,
with the slight haze of the atmosphere, to envelope the tops of the tall
trees in a veil of blue vapour, rendering them almost invisible. Between
these wigwams and the extreme verge of the thickly wooded banks,
which sweeping in bold curvature for an extent of many miles, brings
into view the eastern extremity of Turkey Island, situated midway
between Amherstburg and Detroit, are to be seen, containing the
accumulated Indian dead of many years, tumuli, rudely executed it is
true, but picturesquely decorated with such adornments as it is the
custom of these simple mannered people to bestow on the last
sanctuaries of their departed friends. Some three or four miles, and
across the water, (for here it is that the river acquires her fullest majesty
of expansion,) is to be seen the American Island of Gros Isle, which, at
the period of which we write, bore few traces of cultivation --scarcely a

habitation being visible throughout its extent--various necks of land,
however, shoot out abruptly, and independently of the channel running
between it and the American main shore, form small bays or harbours
in which boats may always find shelter and concealment.
Thus far the view to the right of the spectator, whom we assume to be
facing the river. Immediately opposite to the covering demi lune, and in
front of the fort, appears, at a distance of less than half a mile, a
blockhouse and battery, crowning the western extremity of the Island of
Bois Blanc, which, one mile in length and lashed at its opposite
extremity by