Thomas Chandler Haliburton

“ Slick, said he, the poor labourer does not last long in your country: what with new rum, hard labor, and hot weather, you'll see the graves of the Irish each side of the canals, for all the world like two rows of potatoes in a field that have forgot to come up. It is a land, Sir, continued the Clockmaker, of hard work. We have two kind of slaves, the niggers and the white slaves. All European laborers and blacks, who come out to us, do our hard bodily work, while we direct it to a profitable end; neither rich nor poor, high nor low, with us, eat the bread of idleness. ”

“ I am myself as dry, as seasoned, and as hard as the wood of which my clocks are made. I am a citizen of the world rather than of Slickville. But I too felt my heart sink within me when I reflected that mine, also, was desolate, and that I was alone in my own house, the sole surviving tenant of all that large domestic circle, whose merry voices once made its silent halls vocal with responsive echoes of happiness. We know that our fixed domicile is not here, but we feel that it is and must continue to be our home, ever dear and ever sacred, until we depart hence for another and a better world. ”

“ Reason is comparing two ideas, and drawing an inference. Insanity is, when you have such a rapid succession of ideas, that you can’t compare them. How great then must be the pain when you are almost pressed into insanity and yet retain your reason? What is a broken heart? Is it death? I think it must be very like it, if it is not a figure of speech, for I feel that my heart is broken, and yet I am as sensitive to pain as ever. Nature cannot stand this suffering long. You say these good people have come to take their last farewell of me; most likely, Sam, it is a last farewell. ”

“ Then she mounted a ladder and goes up into the loft-to change.
“‘Judge’ sais I, ‘I am sorry, too, I singed that pig’s tail arter that fashion, for the smell of pork chops makes me feel kinder hungry, and if we had ‘em, no soul could eat ‘em here in such a stye as this. But, dear me,’ sais I, ‘You’d better move, Sir; that old woman is juicy, and I see it a comin’ through the cracks of the floor above, like a streak of molasses.
“‘Mr. Slick,’ sais he, ‘this is dreadful. I never saw any thing so bad before in all this country; but what can’t be cured must be endured, I do suppose. ”

“ I reckon, said the Clockmaker, as he sat himself down on a bundle of shingles, I reckon they are bad off for inns in this country. When a feller is too lazy to work here, he paints his name over his door, and calls it a tavern, and as like as not he makes the whole neighbourhood as lazy as himself—it is about as easy to find a good inn in Halifax, as it is to find wool on a goat's back. An inn, to be a good concarn, must be built a purpose, you can no more make a good tavern out of a common dwelling house, I expect, than a good coat out of an old pair of trowsers. ”

“ It is the heart of the Universe. All the circulation centres here, and hence are derived all those streams that give life and strength to the extremities. How vast, how populous, how rich, how well regulated, how well supplied, how clean, how well ventilated, how healthy!—what a splendid city! How worthy of such an empire and such a people! ”

“ Innocence is the sweetest thing in the world, and there is more of it than folks generally imagine. If you want some to transplant, don’t seek it in the enclosures of cant, for it has only counterfeit ones, but go to the gardens of truth and of sense. Coërced innocence is like an imprisoned lark, open the door and it’s off for ever. The bird that roams through the sky and the groves unrestrained knows how to dodge the hawk and protect itself, but the caged one, the moment it leaves its bars and bolts behind, is pounced upon by the fowler or the vulture. ”

“ Our free and enlightened people is so different, so characteristic and peculiar, it would give a great field to a painter. To sketch the different style of man of each state, so that any citizen would sing right out; Heavens and airth if that don’t beat all! Why, as I am a livin’ sinner that’s the Hoosier of Indiana, or the Sucker of Illinois, or the Puke of Missouri, or the Bucky of Ohio, or the Red Horse of Kentucky, or the Mudhead of Tennesee, or the Wolverine of Michigan or the Eel of New England, or the Corn Cracker of Virginia! ”

“ Authors are vain people, and vanity as well as dignity is indigenous to a colony. Like a pastry-cook’s apprentice, I see so much of both their sweet things around me daily, that I have no appetite for either of them. ”

“ How on airth could we, if we were all like old Pugnose, as lazy as ugly, make that cold thin soil of New-England produce what it does? Why, Sir, the land between Boston and Salem would starve a flock of geese; and yet look at Salem, it has more cash than would buy Nova Scotia from the King. We rise early, live frugally, and work late: what we get we take care of. To all this we add enterprise and intelligence—a feller who finds work too hard here, had better not go to the States. ”

“ How much of love, of tenderness, of forbearance, of kindness, of liberality, is embodied in that word—children: of the same father, members of the same great human family I Love is the bond of union—love dwelleth in the heart; and the heart must be cultivated, that the seeds of affection may germinate in it. ”

“ But the lake and the forest is nature’s amphitheatre, and it is at home there. It won’t speak as it can do at all times and in all places; but it gives its whole soul out in the woods; and the echoes love it, and the mountains wave their plumes of pines to it, as if they wanted to be wooed by its clear, sweet, powerful notes.1 All nature listens to it, and keeps silence, while it lifts its voice on high. The breeze wafts its music on its wings, as if proud of its trust; and the lake lies still, and pants like a thing of life, as if its heart beat to its tones. ”

“ Oh, I wish you could see them!”
“There it is, Sam,” he continued “That illustrates what I always told you of their social system here. We may boast of our independence, but that independence produces isolation. There is an individuality about every man and every family in America, that gives no right of inquiry, and imposes no duty of relief on any one. Sickness, and sorrow, and trouble, are not divulged; joy, success, and happiness are not imparted. If we are independent in our thoughts and actions, so are we left to sustain the burden of our own ills. ”