1916-05-06

THE HERITAGE OF HAMILTONIANS

        If the ancient Hamiltonians who lived in the first half of the last century could only see with the natural eye the heritage they planned and provided for the Hamiltonian of the present day, it would certainly be a surprise to them. A few of the old-timers are still living, but it is doubtful if many of them even know or appreciate the changes that have and are taking place everyday. It is not many years since the went end was almost a desert waste, given over to the town cow for a pasture lot and to the brick makers by day, and to the burning kilns and the unfortunates who sought their warmth by night as they crouched around the hot kilns and slept and dreamt of the happy days of childhood when home and comfort were theirs. All is changing now, and the fine homes, broad streets and concrete walks, brilliantly lighted by night by electric power from Niagara Falls, are making a paradise out of what was once the most forlorn spot in this beautiful valley. An enterprising man who saw the possibilities in the future of that waste territory bought up a few tracts of land and spent money freely and judiciously in laying blocks and streets, building sidewalks, sewer, water and gas mains, and when he had changed the whole landscape and made it fit for the homemaker, then he parceled it out into building lots and invited the Hamilton out to see what a charming place he had prepared for them. Conditions were put in the deeds that would make it impossible for one neighbor to interfere with the rights and comforts of the other, and indeed every reservation was made to guarantee a location for a desirable home. There were doubting Thomases a plenty who said the enterprising shorthorn breeder was wasting his good money to no purpose and that it would be many a long day before people would be lured to make a home in the west end. But he had the faith that builds up cities, and in less than half a dozen years, nearly every lot was sold, fine houses built for first-class citizens, and the man who planned all this laid the foundation for the fortune he has made in less than a dozen years, for he did not stop his promotion of land projects with his west end deal, but is extending his conquests to the north shore of the bay and of old Ontario.

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          Now the McKittrick syndicate is putting the finishing touches in the way of improving the remainder of the west end valley and preparing it for the present and future of Hamiltonians. There is money galore behind this syndicate, and what has been left undone by the former proprietor will be enlarged upon. A trip to the west end will open one’s eyes as to the possibilities at no late date of joining hands with the ancient town of Dundas, and bringing it into the sunlight of this growing and ambitious city. The time was when Dundas was IT, and Hamilton was only the Head of the Lake. After Desjardin built the canal, Dundas was the principal shipping point for all the country west and north of it. The first sailing vessel that was built in this section was the work of a Scotchman whose son is now at the head of the Lake Carriers’ association, and lives in Detroit, and it was a proud day for Dundas when it came floating down the raging Desjardin canal and out into the broad bay at Burlington. Old Captain Peace, who spent his life as a sailor on the upper lakes, made Dundas his terminal point, and young Dan, Hamilton’s ancient tobacconist, slept many a night at the masthead to get beyond the reach of the mosquitoes that bred by the million in the broad bosom of the “Dundas marsh.” Well, the ancient marsh will be drained in time, and may become an extension to the McKittrick syndicate, and through the canal furnish an outlet to the west end to the open sea of Burlington bay. Who knows?

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          Hamilton is a city of great possibilities, for it is not only building in the valley down to the waterside, but is climbing the mountain heights and reaching out toward the Grand river, and in time may take the shores of Lake Erie in as one of its suburbs. There are as many families living on the mountain brow today as the assessors could count up for the entire population of ancient Hamilton when John Fisher was elected the second mayor. Who was John Fisher? Some belated Hamiltonian may ask. John Fisher was an enterprising Yankee boy who crossed the Niagara river long before a suspension bridge joined New York state to Canada and came to Hamilton and started the first foundry and machine shop, and built the first threshing machine in Canada. That was John. Count up the number of factories today in this progressive town and the thousands of hands employed, both men and women, and you can figure out the results of that one little foundry and machine shop, on the corner of James and Merrick streets, the present site of the Royal hotel, that John Fisher built away back in the year 1838. Hamilton was the home of the stove foundry business when you and I were boys, my old Hamiltonian; and it was with a feeling of sadness that I took a stroll through the northwest quarter of the town the other day and saw more than one of the old shops deserted, with the windows boarded up and the neighbourhood in which they are located as quiet as a country graveyard. But the men have fooled away this profitable branch of the molder’s trade. And from all appearance, it has gone forever. Still, there is something doing over in that quarter, and to take the place of the foundries, there are numerous large factory buildings occupied by other trades. The star of enterprise has arisen in the east end, and all along the bay front, down as far as the sandstrip (now politely called the Beach) that used to join this old town and the ancient village of Wellington Square, the line of smokestacks gives one an idea of the present and future greatness that is possible for the home of our youth. Hamilton is the nursery for the factory wealth of Canada, and Montreal pops in and walks away with all the profits. Montreal deserves all it can rake in if our own capitalists will sit idly by and see the rich cream of industry float down the St. Lawrence. And speaking of Montreal reminds us that its enterprising moneyed men are spending their wealth broadcast and gathering in a harvest of dividends. Out in the central part of Illinois, which this old Muser called home for a quarter of a century, Montreal capital has constructed hundreds of miles of electric railway that covers the richest part of the state.

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          But now let us get back to Hamilton and to what it is doing as a manufacturing town. The ancient ones will remember when Lover’s Lane was the eastern terminal of the corporate limits. The present generation will not know it by that name, but if we tell them that it is now better known as Wellington street, then they will be able to locate it. Lover’s Lane was a dear old name to the ancient bucolics who used to do their sparking, by the silvery light of the moon, till such time as they could see their way clear to take each other for better or worse. It required $6 then to buy a marriage license and at least a one note to pay the preacher for the marriage ceremony. And, by the way, we see that by the late law the marriage license fee has been raised again from $2 to $6, only part of which goes to the government and part to some political appointee for issuing it. Why should the issuing of such an important document be given to some favorite shopkeeper? Really, the government might better offer a premium to the young man who has courage enough to marry in these days, when it takes seven cents to buy a one pound loaf of bread and forty cents a pound for butter to make it palatable. If you are rich enough to own a motor car, or even a faithful old horse, take a trip down Main street east – which, by the way, is one of the finest residence streets in the city, take it and by and large out as far as the Delta, where Jackson, an old negro slave made his home nearly a century ago, and you will be surprised at the growth of your home town; and, mind you, it has nearly all been accomplished within the past fifteen years, during which time the population has more than doubled. Broad avenues, lined with handsome homes, with beautiful lawns and flower beds, where only yesterday, you may say, the town cow used to chew its cud and lazily dream of the time when the owner would call to drive it home, with its rich bag of milk to trickle down the family throat. Ah! these are memories of the past that will never return. Turn your motor to the north and get down into the factory district, where you will find massive buildings covering acres of ground, and wanting still more of mother earth for extensions. You, my old Hamiltonian, can remember the time when land down there could be bought at ridiculously low prices : now you might cover an acre of it with one-dollar Dominion bank bills and the owners would only laugh at you for thinking he was going to throw away for nothing. The early pioneers who located that land thought it dear at almost any price. It was old Colonel Land, if our history is not forgotten, who purchased a hundred acres of land in the early days, not far from King and Wellington streets, for a barrel of salt pork and some other trifles. Down in that district are more than four hundred factories, representing hundreds of millions of wealth, and giving labor to thousands of skilled workmen, who have prospered so that they are able to live well on eight and nine hours for a day’s work when their fathers found it hard scratching to make both ends meet with a ten and twelve hour day. This old town is prospering, and with no serious setbacks it will yet become the greatest industrial city in Canada.

1916-03-25

A GAMBLER’S SERMON

        Gamblers are not all bad fellows at heart, and the majority of them will divide their last dollar with any poor unfortunate who is down and out; but if you want to be on the safe side, never sit down with one in a game of poker or faro. It’s business with the gambler then, and he will take advantage of his closest friend, even to his last cent. The chips that pass in the night are not a safe investment for the novice, as many a young fellow in Hamilton has found out to his cost. The playing of cards, even for pleasure, is fascinating, but how much more so when there is something at stake! Do you think that the ladies would waste afternoon after afternoon in playing bridge whist were it not in the hope of winning the prize, be it money or a bit of painted china? Do you think that intellectual and brainy businessmen would spend night after night at their fashionable club playing bridge or draw poker were it not for the fascination of winning, but from the pure spirit of gambling? The facts are we are a race of gamblers, beginning in childhood by playing marbles “for keeps,” then swapping jack-knives, and on by gradual degrees till we become professionals in a haymow game of seven-up. One half the world is forever striving to get the better of the other half, as an evidence of which we need only cite the present game of war to which the Kaiser has invited his kingly neighbors in the hopes that he might get a bit more territory to add to his possessions. It is all a gamble, and as soon as the allied nations get a hand of four aces they will call the Kaiser.

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          So it is through life. It is all a great gamble, even to the food we eat. The average consumer cannot understand why the cold storage houses are filled to bursting with fatness in order to create a scarcity in the provision market when there is more than enough food to supply every want. It is all done that the gamblers in food products may be able to add a few more dollars to their profits. Industrial stocks are so soaked in water that the innocents who invest in them are finally drowned out; it is only the player who holds four aces who wins out. This reminds this old Muser of his younger days when we left this blessed city to seek work in Uncle Sam’s dominions as a printer, dear me, that is nearly sixty-five years ago! Cash being a scarce article in those days we tarried at the first city we came to, and that was Buffalo. Fortune smiled and we got a situation in the Courier office. Jack Thomas was the foreman, and a cleverer fellow never presided over a printing press. Before Jack got experienced in the ways of city life, for he learned his trade in a country office, he was a good boy and a regular attendant at Sunday school, but when he got into the city, things changed. Jack finally drifted from Buffalo down to the Southern States and there he quit the printing, and like Mark Twain, became a river pilot. In those old river days nearly everybody that travelled by steamboat learned to gamble, and Jack being a bright fellow soon became a past master in the art. After a few years of river life, Jack came back to Buffalo and got work in the Courier office and in time was promoted to the foremanship. But we are not writing a biography of the life of Jack Thomas to it as a part of our story on gambling. All the hands in the Courier office were young fellows, as married men in those days preferred to “hold cases” on the afternoon papers. They admired Jack, and enjoyed his stories of the days when he was a Mississippi river pilot. Saturday was an off day in the Courier office, the only work being the filling of cases and getting ready for Sunday night. The Red Jacket saloon was the favorite resort for Saturday afternoon, as the barkeep set a dainty lunch, after which Jack Thomas used to a few lessons in poker to the unsophisticated ones, with the result that Jack had all the money at the end of the game. Jack wasn’t a bad fellow at heart, but the gambling spirit had so become a part of his nature that he would cheat his closest friend in a poker game.

          About sixty years ago, a handsome-looking fellow, with wavy black hair and heavy, drooping moustache, came to Hamilton from one of the country towns close by, and worked as a tinsmith for the D. Moore Co. He had a fine baritone voice, and being an excellent singer, he soon won his way into the society of young people. His manners were irreproachable, and to all appearances his habits were good. Every Sunday he had a seat in some choir, for every choirmaster was glad to have his help in the heavy anthems. By and by it began to leak out that the handsome tinsmith was a close student of the “Book of Four Kings,” and that he had quite a large class at his Saturday night and Sunday séances. In time the choirmasters gave him to understand that they could dispense with his glorious voice, and he finally faded out of sight.

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          Hamilton used to have quite a reputation in the gambling line, but we presume all that is past now. In the early days a bright young fellow from up Simcoe way came to the city to take the job of reporter on the Spectator, shortly after it started as a daily. Robert Smiley, the editor and owner of the paper, was a regular driver and anyone that worked for him had to be on the job early and late. Newspaper reporting was not much in vogue in Canada in the early ‘50s, andit was expected of the reporter that he should attend to the collecting as well as soliciting for advertising; and for all this talent the reporter was paid the munificent salary of eight dollars a week. The young fellow had good talent and could dress up an item of news to make it attractive and readable, but as items were scarce, very often less than half a column would be his limit for a day’s work, and he would spend evenings with a few choice convivial souls at the fascinating game of poker, at which he was quite an expert. Mr. Smiley called him down for the small showing he made in the paper, when the reporter invited him to take a trip to Hades, saying that he had a better job in view that would pay him eight dollars many times over for his week’s work. He opened a club room in the Anglo-American hotel, and business with him was prospering finely when Chief Carruthers was compelled to put a stop to him. Nearly every hotel had its club room in those days.

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          Here is the experience of an old printer who had served in the same company with the Muser in the American civil war. We had worked side by side at the case, and a warm attachment had sprung up between us. Before the war, he had never gambled, nor did he even know how to play cards. However, to kill the monotony of camp life, he soon learned to play for pastime and became an expert poker player. After the war, setting type was too tame a business for him, for he could make more money at the poker table than setting type on a morning paper. To all appearances he was a gentleman in his habits. His clothes were good, of the latest pattern and most fashionable cut. His watch chain was the heaviest of the heavy, and as fine as gold of Orphir. It surpassed in richness the gold chain that the king hung around the neck of the young prophet Daniel. His boots were highly polished, and shone like the exterior of a black walnut coffin. His diamond pin twinkled like the evening star in a soft summer sky. His shirt bosom was as white as an infant’s soul, but his eyes were sad, and his voice was as sorrowful and sorrowing as the wailing of the winds in the drooping branches of the weeping willow. He taped his boot with his gold-headed cane, slipped down in his chair to gibe the base of his spinal column a rest, pulled his hat down over his eyes, and languidly said “-“ which plainly indicated that our friend had struck a loser, had coppered in the wrong place. It is many years sine we met, but the story he told of his life was so sadly interesting that we have never forgotten it. We cannot tell it as he did, but will try to give the outlines in the hope that it may influence some novice in gambling to “stop and think before he farther goes.”

          “Faro,” he said, “is a fascinating game! In all the games for gambling, it has no equal. A man’s a fool to play it, but it catches the oldest of ‘em. Like poker or bridge whist, it will draw you on to final ruin. The chances,on the closest calculations are three to one on each play against the player; occasionally we strike a winner, but we only win to lose. The most prosperous of us die in the gutter – unknown, forgotten and deserted. Luck only smiles on us for a brief season, and when fickle fortune deserts us, she never roosts over our doors again! Few of us are wise enough to save in luck in order to win on a rainy day. But while we live, we live; and after all that is all there is to life. The hereafter is a chance, and the cards are so well put up that nobody has ever called the trump. We are not utterly heartless. It makes my heart ache to see how many young men are drawn into the vortex and down to ruin. They begin by betting on a game of baseball; they lose on a horse race; get caught in a friendly game of draw or bridge whist; and in an evil hour, try to get even on faro.

          “They often win on the first venture, but it is a terrible success. They always play one thousand per cent, or the first winning, and often they play life and blood on the investment. The first winning opens the fascinating road to hell; builds a barrier behind them which few ever climb over to reformation. A little sentimental, ain’t i? I’m blue today. Gambling and its attendant excitements burn all the stamina out of a man, but, thank God! It cannot, does not, blot out his sympathies. I wish I had never touched a card, but I am a born gambler. It’s in me; it always was; and I’m in for it till the deal is out. I wish I had stuck to the old ‘stick and rule,’ and then I might have married and settled down to a happy life, with my own home, and a dear wife and children. I hate to see young men of promise at a gaming table. They have mothers and sisters, and probably a wife and children, who love them; they deny they set foot inside a gambling room; their fate is sealed. I have a case in mind now. A fine fellow, who was an agent for a new York printing machinery house and commended a salary of $5,000 a year. In traveling he got lonely; he gambled for amusement and to kill time when his business was over. He fooled with the tiger, put his hand through the bars, petted the beast, and suddenly found himself torn to pieces. Today he is an outcast – drunken, broken and deserted and I would advise every young man who has a business to never cross the threshold of gambling house. I have made big winnings and I have made big losings. I lost $6,000 in Chicago trying to make $10,000. I was broke and down for a long while. I am up again. If I had a business, you would never catch me gambling again. I am getting too old for typesetting, and I could never learn to run a linotype. Guess I’ll go and buy a couple of stacks of reds and see how luck runs today. Goodbye, old comrade.”

1916-04-15

        HARRIET ANNIE WILKINS

          Away back in the first half of the first half of the last century, the family of the Rev. John Wilkins, an English Congregationalist clergyman, came from the old homeland and settled in Hamilton. Of Mr. Wilkins but very little is known, as he passed away shortly after arriving in the city; but it is of the two daughters, Harrie Annie and Mrs. Robinson, that this reminiscence will have to do, as both of them were connected with the education of ancient Hamiltonians, especially Harriet Annie, who was the gifted poet that sang of the early days. This old Muser has a very kindly remembrance of Harriet Annie for writing his new year address in 1851, when he was an apprentice in the Canada Christian Advocate office. In those days, the new year address was the perquisite of the carrier boy, from which he realized what seemed a fortune to him, the subscribers to the paper giving him from a penny to a half dollar each. The address was generally on local matters and very interesting, and the young poets of the town vied with each other as to which one would carry off the palm in point of literary style. There were four papers published in Hamilton in 1850 – the Gazette, Spectator, Journal and Express, and the Christian Advocate – and the carrier boys of each paper had his new year’s greeting. This old Muser was fortunate in getting Harriet Annie as his poet laureate, for her poems were very popular with the people. If you want a boy to remember you with affection, even after the grass has withered on your grave for years, do him a kindly act, and he will never forget it. Out of that address the Muser realized over twenty dollars. When we called upon Miss Wilkins to share our wealth, she generously declined accepting a penny. However, she accepted with pleasure a copy of the address printed on cream-colored satin, which she said should be preserved by her during her lifetime. That was a characteristic act of Hamilton’s sweet singer, for her whole life was given to add to the comfort and happiness of others. Her life was chiefly remarkable for her labors of active charity and of self-denial.

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          The managing editor of the Spectator received a letter from Mrs. D. Wilkins Van Maurer, a resident of Atlanta, Georgia, making inquiries about Harriet Annie. You remember the lamentation of Rip Van Winkle, after his long sleep in the Kaatskill Mountains, and on his return to the village of Falling Waters, “How soon we’re forgotten when we’re gone.” When the managing editor turned Mrs. Van Maurer’s letter to this old Muser we thought it was but the work of an hour to trace out Harriet Annie’s later life. She had been dead not quite thirty years, and having spent at least fifty years of active life in this town we expected that all we would have to do would be to ask the first ancient Hamiltonian we met in the street as to her history, and we are blessed if he could tell anything. All he did remember was that a poet of that name once lived in Hamilton and that she taught a school somewhere  on James street, and that his sister was one of her pupils. Pretty bad start, eh? We remembered that in the year 1851 she wrote a eulogy on Ancient Masonry, and that it was published in a booklet, and concluded that all we had to do was ask some member of the ancient craft to help us out. The first one we applied to, although his head is now whitened with the snows of sixty or more frigid Hamilton winters, and he was one of her pupils in his childhood days, yet he could only remember that such a person once lived here sixty-five or seventy years ago, but beyond the knowledge that she used to shake him up when he failed in his lessons, there was nothing more that he could tell. Then we interviewed a couple of the ancient girls who knew Harriet Annie before Hamilton became an incorporated city. They knew her intimately, and said all the nice things possible about her poetry, but they could not remember when she left this world, nor anything special about her beyond that she was a most lovable woman who spent her life in doing good and in helping the unfortunate over rough roads. Then we searched the church records, hoping there to find something that would answer the inquiries of the lady in Atlanta, Georgia. When all else failed, there was the cemetery record left, and in it we found the date of her death. We are getting on solid ground, for with the date we could refer back to the bound files of the Daily Spectator, and there we found the following:

          “Died, in her home, 64 Main street west, on Saturday, January 7, 1888, Harriet Annie Wilkins, last surviving daughter of Rev. John Wilkins, born in England, aged 58 years and nine months.”

          At last we had got on the right trail, and then the daylight dawned. By searching the Hamilton directory of 1856 we found that Miss Wilkins occupied the cottage on the corner of James and Gore streets, where now stands the Grand Opera house, where she and her sister taught a day school for young boys and girls, and in addition gave lessons in music and painting to scholars of maturer years. Later the school was changed to an academy for the preparation of young ladies for entrance to college. Both the Misses Wilkins were accomplished scholars, and their academy was well filled with pupils. In time Harriet  Annie was left alone with her school, for her sister was united in marriage to a Mr. Robinson. It was a long struggle, for school teachers in the early days were but poorly paid for their work; and often the quarterly fee was never paid to them by the scholars’ parents. By and by death came knocking at the door, and Mrs. Robinson was called hence, leaving a family of young children of young children to Harriet to provide out of her meager earnings as a school teacher. Her great woman’s heart was equal to the task, for she not only attended to her duties in the schoolroom and in the home, but she was most active in visiting the sick, the sorrowful and the sinful. Wherever sickness, poverty or crime found a lodgment, Miss Wilkins considered it her duty to be to extend assistance, comfort and counsel. The home of poverty was brightened and the bed of death made less terrible by her coming. Her Christianity was broad enough for her to take into her heart Protestant and Catholic alike, and often did she stand by the sickbed with Bishop Farrell or Dean Geddes to aid in ministering to the afflicted ones of their flock. The guilty prisoner was urged by her to repent and strive for reformation; the unfortunate received for her not only wise counsel, but material aid. A cup of cold water given in the right spirit is often more efficacious than a wordy prayer. Quietly and unostentatiously she carried on her labors of love and duty, and very few people knew how active she was in the great work of practical philanthropy. Her whole life was spent in the service of others. Miss Wilkins possessed considerable literary ability. She was a frequent contributor to the local newspapers and published several volumes of poems, which gave evidence of pure and lofty ideas, gracefully expressed. Her longest poem was a Masonic story, of which order she had an exalted opinion as a charitable and useful organization, and many of her best poems were written in its praise. Her first volume was published in 1851, entitled the Holly Branch, and was dedicated “To Sir Allan Napier Macnab, Knight, M.P.P., and the Fraternity of Freemasons.”

          “The Holly Branch is in itself a type of your institution. How often, amid the delicate flowers of spring, the glorious rose of summer, or the dazzling splendor of autumnal beauty, is the Holly – the evergreen Holly – forgotten! But when the winter storms gather around, then are the crimson berries and verdant leaves cherished; and in my own native land, from the poorest peasant on England’s soil to the royal chambers of England’s Queen, the holly branch droops its fadeless clusters. Forgive us, then, if we have desecrated a type of masonry by linking it with our feeble efforts.” So wrote Hamilton’s gifted singer, in her dedicatory prelude.

          With a knowledge that her life would soon be spent, she bravely continued to the end to help others. Her last illness was terrible in its painfulness from cancer. For nearly a year she was unable to leave her bed; and her sufferings were so acute that only by the use of morphine could she get any relief. A friend who was with her in the closing hours of her life, in telling the sad story to the Muser, said that her acute agony was borne by her with resignation and uncomplaining fortitude. A poor heroic life came to an end. The poor, weary body was at last laid to rest. Her endless reward was entered upon. Her funeral was held on January 10, 1888, and was largely attended by the poor and afflicted ones in whose betterment she took so much interest, and by the members of the Masonic order. Mr. James Charlton, general passenger agent of the Chicago and Alton road, sent from Chicago a wreath, Gates ajar, and the local Masonic fraternity contributed a wreath with a square and compass and the letter G in the center. Thus passed from the active life of Hamilton one of its most philanthropic women. But we cannot refrain, in closing this brief reminiscence from repeating Rip Van Winkle’s lament : “How soon we’re forgotten when we’re gone.”

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          In this connection let us recall to the memory of ancient Hamiltonians a couple of Harriet Annie’s poems, published in the Holly Branch :

                    HAMILTON, THE CITY OF STRANGERS

          How many a land do we call our own,

          The countries which o’er the depths are thrown?

          But how few may stand on the well-known spot

          Where fell the first smiles of their childhood’s lot;

          We come to throng where of old there stood

          The spreading maple and the tangle wood.

          We have seen the cliffs of the spreading shore

          Fade ‘mid the rush of the water’s roar;

          And voices that rose to sad farewell strains

          Were lost ‘mid the grating of cable chains.

          Some from our beautiful Albion Isles,

          From the lofty fanes, from the flower’s smiles;

          These – from the glittering of olden spire;

          Those – from the light of their household fires;

          Some from the midst of the city throng,

          Some are fresh from the wood-dove’s song,

          Where the holly bush and the broad oak grows;

          Many are from the land of the Rose.

          And many a son of the Thistle green

          Hath said farewell to each boyish scene,

          And dwelleth still with the stranger’s cild,

          Far from the heather and mountain wild.

          And others from Erin’s emerald sod,

          The shore of a western clime have trod;

          Still, they cherish dreams of their place of birth,

          Of the shamrock leaf and the verdant earth.

          And a few from the vine-clothed hills of France,

          Where the sun is warm in his noontide glance;

          A few have come from the mountain’s brow,

          Some have sighed for the orange bough;

          A few from the fields of growing rice,

          And the luscious fruits of the groves of spice.

          Some are called in from the ocean gales,

          They have cast their anchor and furled their sails;

          And changed the dash of the foaming spray

          For the calm, broad waters of Burlington Bay.

          Thus are we gathered a stranger band

          From the homes of many a distant land;

          Oh! would that at last, when from every coast,

          Man shall come forth like a thronging host,   

          That we who have dwelt as a foreign throng

          May together hear the seraphim’s song;

          In a land where the stranger’s sadness is o’er,

          And the dwellers in glory go out no more.

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                   THE OLD STEAMER MAGNET

          How few of the present generation have even heard of the good old steamer Magnet, one of the first iron-built steamboats to sail in American waters. The Magnet and the Passport were built about the same time, both iron-plated, and were built by Canadian companies to ply on Lake Ontario and down the St. Lawrence to Montreal. The Magnet was owned principally by Hamilton capitalists, and officered by Hamilton men – Captain Sutherland, who was killed in the Desjardins canal accident fifty-nine years ago; Captain Fairgrieve, who was the purser, and F. W. Fearman, who had charge of the quartermaster’s stores. The name of the Magnet was afterward changed to Hamilton, and after many mishaps, in one of which she found a watery grave and was raised to the surface again, she was sold and transferred to some other route. Miss Wilkins was a summer passenger on the old Magnet, and on her trip, wrote the following verses, which she delivered to the commander, Captain Sutherand:

          Away we haste like a flitting bird,

No sounds of cable or chains are heard,

But rapid and still as spirit’s flight

We are passing over the waters bright;

A few year’s ago and the Indian’s bark

Shot like a deer o’er the waters dark,

Where now, through splashing and silvery spray,

The iron magnet is plowing her way.

Hamilton’s far-bound and queenly boat,

May success be yours when your banners float;

You are born to bear, ah! who? – what forms

Shall tread on your decks ‘midst smiles and storms?

The known – the stranger – the mean – the brave,

All may comingle – all, but the slave –

All but the fettered; they cannot breathe

Where Britannia’s banner its folds unwreathe.

To thee, kind commander, thanks we pour,

For the peaceful joy of this festive hour;

For the glorious rush of dividing waves;

For the thrilling bound over hidden caves.

May your Magnet attract Concordia’s smile,

As you traverse many a dreary mile;

Attract the sun in his smiling dance,

Attract the moon in her nightly glance;

Attract the light of the gold-bearing cars,

So, through tedious watching, be watched by stars.

When time hath marred this beautiful bark,

And the light of her glory is dim and dark;

Where shall we be who have trod her deck?

When Burlington’s pride is a lonely wreck?

We would not be cast on a desolate shore,

Like a broken toy to be gilt no more;

But drawn by a Magnet, whose power is blest,

To the harbor of peace, and haven of rest.