Jobbers of C - - and those of the backwoods
to draw the new comer into their nets. The demand created by the
continual influx of immigrants had caused a rapid increase in the
price of lands, particularly of wild lands, and the grossest
imposition was often practiced by these people, who made enormous
profits by taking advantage of the ignorance of the new settlers
and of their anxiety to settle themselves at once.
I was continually cautioned by these people against buying a farm
in any other locality than the particular one they themselves
represented as most eligible, and their rivals were always
represented as unprincipled land-jobbers. Finding these accusations
to be mutual, I naturally felt myself constrained to believe both
parties to be alike.
Sometimes I got hold of a quiet farmer, hoping to obtain something
like disinterested advice; but in nine cases out of ten, I am sorry
to say, I found that the rage for speculation and trading in land,
which was so prevalent in all the great thoroughfares, had already
poisoned their minds also, and I could rarely obtain an opinion or
advice which was utterly free from self-interest. They generally had
some lot of land to sell - or, probably, they would like to have a
new comer for a neighbour, in the hope of selling him a span of
horses or some cows at a higher price than they could obtain from
the older settlers. In mentioning this unamiable trait in the
character of the farmers near C - -, I by no means intend to give
it as characteristic of the farmers in general. It is, properly
speaking, a LOCAL vice, produced by the constant influx of strangers
unacquainted with the ways of the country, which tempts the farmers
to take advantage of their ignorance.
STANZAS
Where is religion found? In what bright sphere
Dwells holy love, in majesty serene
Shedding its beams, like planet o'er the scene;
The steady lustre through the varying year
Still glowing with the heavenly rays that flow
In copious streams to soften human woe?
It is not 'mid the busy scenes of life,
Where careworn mortals crowd along the way
That leads to gain - shunning the light of day;
In endless eddies whirl'd, where pain and strife
Distract the soul, and spread the shades of night,
Where love divine should dwell in purest light.
Short-sighted man! - go seek the mountain's brow,
And cast thy raptured eye o'er hill and dale;
The waving woods, the ever-blooming vale,
Shall spread a feast before thee, which till now
Ne'er met thy gaze - obscured by passion's sway;
And Nature's works shall teach thee how to pray.
Or wend thy course along the sounding shore,
Where giant waves resistless onward sweep
To join the awful chorus of the deep -
Curling their snowy manes with deaf'ning roar,
Flinging their foam high o'er the trembling sod,
And thunder forth their mighty song to God!
