No Police In Those Halcyon Days; But With The Thickening Shades Of Evening Issued Forth That Venerable Brotherhood, The City Watch.

The watch, did we say?

Where are now these dreamy wanderers of the night, carolling forth, like the muezzin in Eastern cities, their hourly calls, "All's well!" "Fine night!" "Bad weather!" as the case might be - equally ready with their rattles to sound the dread alarm of fire, or with their long batons to capture belated midnight brawlers, that is, when they saw they had a good chance of escaping capture themselves. Their most formidable foes were not the thieves, but the gay Lotharios and high-fed swells of the time, returning from late dinners, and who made it a duty, nay, a crowning glory, to thrash the Watch! Where now are those practical jokers who made collections of door-knockers (the house-bell was not then known), exchanged sign- boards from shop-doors, played unconscionable tricks on the simple- minded peasants on market-days - surreptitiously crept in at suburban balls, in the guise of the evil one, and, by the alarm they at times created, unwittingly helped Monsieur le Cure to frown down upon these mundane junkettings.

One of these escapades is still remembered here. [79]

Four of these gentlemanly practical jokers, one night, habited in black like the Prince of Darkness, drove silently through the suburbs in a cariole drawn by two coal-black steeds, and meeting with a well-known citizen, overcome by drink, asleep in the snow, they silently but vigorously seized hold of him with an iron grip; a cahot and physical pain having restored him to consciousness, he devoutly crossed himself, and, presto! was hurled into another snow-drift. Next day all Quebec had heard in amazement how, when and where Beelzebub and his infernal crew had been seen careering in state after nightfall. Oh! the jolly days and gay nights of olden times!

But the past had other figures more deserving of our sympathy. The sober-sided sires of the frolicsome gentry just described: the respected tradesmen who had added dollar to dollar to build up an independence - whose savings their children were squandering so recklessly; those worthy citizens who had filled without stipend numerous civic offices, with a zeal, a whole-heartedness seldom met with in the present day - at once churchwardens, justices of the peace, city fathers, members of societies for the promotion of agriculture, of education, for the prevention of fires; who never sat up later than nine of the clock p.m., except on those nights when they went to the old Parliament Building to listen in awe to fiery Papineau or eloquent Bourdages thunder against the Bureaucracy; who subscribed and paid liberally towards every work of religion, of charity, of patriotism; who every Saturday glanced with trembling eye over the columns of the Official Gazette, to ascertain whether Government had not dismissed them from the Militia or Commission of the Peace, for having attended a public meeting, and having either proposed or seconded a motion backing up Papineau and censuring the Governor. Thrilling - jocund - simple war-like time of 1837, where art thou flown?"

The "sunny Esplanade," the "Club," the "Platform," in those days "rather small," the "Rink," "Montmorency Falls," "Lake Charles," the "Citadel" and its "hog's-back," it would appear, inspired the bard of the 25th King's Own Borderers - for years forming part of our garrison - on this favourite regiment embarking for England, to waft to the old Rock the following poetic tribute.

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